Predictions for Homestead

NASCAR Racing 11-14-06

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Column: It’s all but over
by Monte Dutton
Gazette Sports Writer

The Chase for the Nextel Cup isn’t over, entering its final race at Homestead-Miami Speedway, but it’s on life support.

Jimmie Johnson hasn’t yet been christened as the 28th champion of NASCAR’s premier series, but surely, at long last, he’s destined to win the title that has thus far painfully eluded him. He deserves it, by any measure, and only a far-fetched, cruel attack of wretched luck could deprive him.

There is justice in the scenario, even if his recent performances have undermined what NASCAR officials obviously aspired to when they devised the Chase format. At least for now, the system doesn’t even matter. In the Chase, Johnson has outscored Matt Kenseth, his closest pursuer, in points by a 1,287-1,219 margin.

At the end of the 26-race regular season, Johnson trailed Kenseth by 57 points. Then, of course, the points were reconfigured, trimming Kenseth’s edge to five and bringing eight other drivers into the race.

Now, though, even had the old, pre-2004, system been maintained, Johnson would enter the final race as the leader. Oddly, there would be more of a race under the old system. Johnson now leads Kenseth by 63 points. Under the old format, the margin would be 11.

That’s irrelevant — interesting, but irrelevant — but the salient point is that Johnson deserves to be ahead by any measure.

That 63-point edge makes Johnson the overwhelming favorite to nail down the title, but there are four other drivers — Kenseth, Phoenix winner Kevin Harvick, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and rookie Denny Hamlin — who remain mathematically alive.

Johnson can afford to finish 12th and lead not a single lap, yet still win the championship even if Kenseth wins the Ford 400 and leads the most laps. In the past five races, a period over which Johnson’s average finish has been 1.8, Kenseth’s average has been 10.8. In those five races, Johnson has led 373 laps; Kenseth, three.

Kenseth, given his recent performances, is as much a long shot as the three other drivers clinging to mathematical life. Johnson, who started 29th in Sunday’s Checker Auto Parts 500, expertly drove up through the field to finish second to Harvick. That’s the biggest obstacle he is likely to have to surmount. There were no crashes for Johnson to avoid in the first 225 laps, and by that time, he’d already led and was running fourth.

Similarly, past records don’t offer much hope for the four other marginal contenders. Johnson has a solid Homestead record. In the past four races, his average finish on the 1.5-mile oval is 13.25. Only Harvick’s average, 10.0, is better. Earnhardt Jr.’s average is 21.75, Kenseth’s 26.25 and Hamlin placed 33rd in his only previous appearance. Only Johnson, Harvick and Kenseth, who finished third last year, have ever finished in the top five at Homestead. None of the contenders has ever won.

Johnson’s never won a championship, but there’s not the slightest hint that he’s going to beat himself. Stranger things have happened, but it would really be an injustice if Johnson were again deprived of that elusive championship.

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