Bob Pockrass: Truck series, Nationwide need Chase format

By Bob Pockrass - Associate Editor

Friday, November 21, 2008

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32 Comments

COMMENTARY

The Nationwide and Craftsman Truck series seasons came down to the last lap this year, and the quick reaction to their point system would be to not change a thing.

Who needs that stupid Chase format when things can finish just as tight with a season-long points battle, not some regular-season/playoff format that can be confusing and allows drivers to be mediocre during the first part of the year.

I’ll tell you who needs the Chase format: The Nationwide and the Truck series.

Yes, the points battles were exciting without a Chase. But there are several reasons why there should be a Chase:

First, it would allow more drivers to compete for the title. If fans wanted to watch Carl Edwards and Clint Bowyer battle for a title, they could watch them race in the Sprint Cup Series.

It would have been more fun watching Edwards and Bowyer battle for the title with Brad Keselowski, Mike Bliss, Marcos Ambrose, David Ragan and others.

On the Truck side, if Todd Bodine, Mike Skinner and others could have gotten into the fray, it would have been interesting. Maybe Jack Sprague finishes the season at Kevin Harvick Inc. to see if he can make a run at the title after a fairly underachieving first half of the year.

More importantly, it has the potential to give more drivers – and more sponsors – exposure. It might give television an incentive to show and talk about the drivers battling for 10th in points during the regular season. It gives the media a reason to talk about more drivers.

Another plus would be that the Chase format, at least on the Cup side, has required teams to string a series of great performances together. A sixth-place here, a ninth-place there and a seventh-place there just don’t do it. A driver needs to win and at least post a few top-five finishes.

Bowyer didn’t win in his final 10 Nationwide races, but he did average a 5.9 finish in those, so it shows that even the current system can require you to be strong down the line. Amazingly, Edwards also averaged a 5.9 – thanks to a 37th-place finish at Bristol before he averaged a 2.4 finish over the final nine events.

On the Truck side, with only 25 races, it probably would be best to have 17 or 18 regular-season events with seven or eight Chase races. That’s enough to create drama but also require a driver and team to show versatility at various tracks to be crowned a champion.

One thing that might help these other series as well is to end their season earlier. Why not crown the Truck champion at Texas, the Nationwide champion at Phoenix and then the Cup champion at Homestead? NASCAR likes its current championship weekend format, but it could find a way to make Homestead interesting. Maybe some sort of all-star event with the Truck and Nationwide drivers could cap the year.

The Chase format will work in these series. And even though NASCAR had good points races with their current format this season, it should continue to examine whether its Chase system would make a good thing even better.