Dale Earnhardt Jr. thinks everyone can agree that the NASCAR Cup Series runs through Chevrolet’s Hendrick Motorsports, Ford’s Team Penske and Toyota’s Joe Gibbs Racing right now but he struggles to rank exactly what order to put them in.
He articulated why on Tuesday’s Dale Jr Download.
“I think Hendrick up until this race [Kansas], this is my opinion before the race, Penske was the fastest, which is odd because usually that’s them at the end of the year. I don’t know what that means at the end of this year because they’re rarely this quick early in the season. Hendrick is the most consistent and very boring,” Earnhardt said. “Now, Larson‘s kicking ass, having a great year, got great speed and statistics. … His average mile-and-a-half finish is like 4.5. The next highest driver is 10th.
“… Excluding Larson, HMS has been monotonous, just prodding. So, I would say they’re kind of the No. 2 team to me and Gibbs — I know Christopher Bell has been awesome but they’re up and down. Here, lately, they’ve kind of been more down than up. They’re all very close, I’m not saying there’s a massive advantage for one over the other [but] they’re the three teams that I look at. You’ll have a Trackhouse pop off and get a top-five or maybe win a race. 23XI is the same thing but they’re the B-teams. They’re second-tier teams to me.”
It’s worth noting that Larson is the points leader and shares the league wins lead with Christopher Bell of JGR. Denny Hamlin of JGR has two wins. Penske affiliated driver Joey Logano, Austin Cindric and Josh Berry have won.
The other Hendrick drivers William Byron, Chase Elliott and Alex Bowman haven’t won but are second, fourth and eighth in the standings.
So how does Earnhardt interpret that data now?
“After this race, I got to say it’s about even now,” Earnhardt said. “I know it’s one damn race and this sport ebbs and flows week-to-week, but that’s a fun conversation to me to rank the teams, judge the organizations because this Next Gen car and how it’s a kit car, has made that conversation relevant. I guess after the end of the race and even during the middle of the race, when Chase Elliott drove through the middle of the field, I’m like, ‘This is fucking impressive.’ I haven’t seen the speed out of his car, haven’t seen this kind of speed out of many of the HMS cars outside of Larson.
“But Bowman drove up to the front of the field earlier in the race, Byron was probably going to be a contender had the tire not blown. They were strong. And I think that looks good for them [Hendrick] going into Charlotte. I really do. I think we’ll see somewhat similar speeds and performance from these organizations at the next race.”
