And that’s a wrap on the 2018 NASCAR Cup series season. But you didn’t think I’d leave you hanging without a StatWatch year in review column?
From a pair of eight-race winners to an unexpected champion, this season really had a lot to pore over from a statistical basis. And that’s really my favorite kind of poring to do.
Usually, I give you my three favorite stats of the week. But this is no normal week. This column has to last you through the cold, dark winter. Or until I get back on my Twitter account (cough, @WillisOnNASCAR, cough) and tweet you fun morsels of NASCAR stat delicious nougat. Mmm, nougat.
So kick back, grab a holiday meal and put your feet up. You deserve it. And let me do the heavy statistical lifting!
Was Logano really an unlikely champion?
This season really belonged to Kyle Busch and Kevin Harvick. Each won eight races, and they combined for more than 3,400 laps led. But you can’t overlook the consistency that led Joey Logano to a championship.
Logano had 26 top-10 finishes, three fewer than Harvick and two fewer than Busch. But it was the same number that the 2017 dominant champion Martin Truex Jr. had, and 10 more than the 2016 champion Jimmie Johnson had.
As a matter of fact, 26 top-10 finishes matches Truex for the most by any Cup champion dating back to 2000. To find the last time a driver had more than that in a championship season, you have to go to Dale Jarrett in 1999.
In that season, Jarrett had four wins (to Logano’s three) and zero poles (to Logano’s one).
Something to be Happy about
Let’s take a moment to fully appreciate the season that Kevin “Happy” Harvick had.
I’ve waxed poetic about Harvick’s eight-win campaign, setting a career-high at the age of 42 and tying for the second-most wins in a season after turning 42, behind Bobby Allison‘s eight in 1982 and Lee Petty‘s 11 in 1959.
Now, let’s examine his full stat line for the year. Eight wins, 23 top-5s and 29 top-10s. He’s the first driver to hit all of those marks in a season in the modern era, which dates back to 1972.
The last to do it in any era were Richard Petty and Bobby Allison in 1971. Petty ran 46 races that season and Allison 42, both much more than Harvick’s 36-race 2018 season.
At second glance
Kyle Larson had a winless 2018 season, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t make history.
Larson finished with six runner-up finishes, tied with Terry Labonte in 1982 for the second-most in a winless season. The only driver who had more without a win was Harry Gant in 1981.
Gant bounced back with two wins and a fourth-place finish in 1982. Labonte won once and finished fifth in points in 1983.
Larson also won three poles this season, becoming the first driver to do that in a winless season since Mark Martin in 2012.
But the most select list comes with the fact that Larson led 782 laps. The only drivers with more recorded laps led (they weren’t always tracked in the earliest days of NASCAR) in a winless season were Gant in 1981 (1,078) and Jeff Gordon in 2010 (919).
Cause for concern
I’m fairly pro-NASCAR, but I’m also a realist. And I realize the sport has some issues that need to be addressed. But I’m not an engineer, and I don’t know how to fix these problems. But I am a numbers guys, and I can tell you these things:
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There were an average of 15.3 lead changes per race this season, down from 16.5 last season. The 15.3 mark is the lowest since 1992.
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The average margin of victory was over two seconds for the first time since 2009.
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There was an average of 17.5 cars finishing on the lead lap this season, the fewest since 2012.
OK, I’m also a solutions man, so let’s figure this out. Together. As a team. Will the meetings be catered?
Sadler’s swan song
This was Elliott Sadler‘s final season, and while he didn’t make the Championship Four in the Xfinity Series, he still finished 14th at Homestead-Miami Speedway, just enough to hold onto fifth in points.
That was Sadler’s eighth top-5 finish in the Xfinity standings, two more than any driver that never won a title. He also had four runner-up finishes in points, the most of any driver to never win a title in series history.
There’s been 1,173 races in Xfinity Series history (formally recognized as dating back to the 1982 season). By my count, Sadler has led the points after 83 of those races, seven more than any other driver in series history (Jack Ingram is second with 76).
And it’s easily the most by a driver to never win the series championship. Second-most in that category is Kenny Wallace with 33, then Regan Smith with 21.
But let’s not think Sadler’s legacy is solely a “so close, but so far” situation. Sadler also ranks third in series history with 226 top-10 finishes (behind Kevin Harvick and Kyle Busch). He was also part of the inaugural NASCAR Cup Series Playoff field in 2004 and also the first Xfinity Series playoff field in 2016.
That’s all I have for you. Enjoy the offseason, and I’ll see you for the Daytona 500!