{"id":137423,"date":"2025-09-12T01:08:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-12T01:08:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/137423\/"},"modified":"2025-09-12T01:08:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-12T01:08:08","slug":"denny-hamlin-evaluates-chances-in-second-round-of-nascar-playoffs-makes-bold-predictions-for-bristol","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/137423\/","title":{"rendered":"Denny Hamlin evaluates chances in second round of NASCAR playoffs, makes bold predictions for Bristol"},"content":{"rendered":"

Denny Hamlin is getting ready for the NASCAR Cup Series race at Bristol and the second round of the Cup Series Playoffs, which begin next week. On the Actions Detrimental podcast<\/a>, Hamlin evaluated his chances in the second round, which will have 12 drivers competing for the championship. <\/p>\n

\u201cYou need to get off to a hot start in the second round,\u201d Denny Hamlin said. \u201cTalladega (third-round race), I feel like, is level for everyone, where the Roval probably isn\u2019t. My shot of wrecking at Talladega is probably the same percentage amount this it is for Austin Cindric or whoever, Ryan Blaney. I\u2019m not worried about [Talladega] for those reasons. I know it\u2019s going to be the roll of the dice, if I crap out, I crap out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hamlin then said, \u201cSpeed will matter\u201d when competing at the Roval. He then said his team has to \u201cget some work done early\u201d in the second round. The good news for Hamlin is that he has more playoff points than any of the 15 other drivers, which puts him in a good position to have success in the Round of 12.<\/p>\n

Denny Hamlin doesn\u2019t see changes in the NASCAR Playoff standings <\/p>\n

Hamlin then shared his thoughts on Bristol, which will be an elimination race. \u201cIt\u2019s just a very, very tough track to race scared,\u201d he said. \u201cRacing scared means looking at points.\u201d Hamlin then named drivers like Ross Chastain, Joey Logano and Cindric \u201cwill race apprehensive\u201d because of how the track lays out. <\/p>\n

The drivers Hamlin mentioned are above the playoff cut line. <\/a>As for the four drivers who are below the cut line, the three-time Daytona 500 winner said, \u201cI see no one from the bottom four that is a threat to go out there and score 50 points.\u201d Hamlin then added that Chastain, Logano and Cindric are \u201csafe just based off of how they\u2019re racing.\u201d<\/p>\n

If Hamlin is right, that means Austin Dillon, Shane van Gisbergen, Alex Bowman and Josh Berry will be eliminated from the playoffs after Bristol if neither one of them wins on Saturday night. However, Dillon is only 11 points below the cut line and will battle Cindric hard for the final spot in the second round. We\u2019ll find out who makes the Round of 12 when the race takes place this Saturday at 7:30 p.m. ET on the USA Network.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Denny Hamlin is getting ready for the NASCAR Cup Series race at Bristol and the second round of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":137424,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[446],"tags":[49,48,634,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-137423","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nascar","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-nascar","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137423","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137423"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137423\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/137424"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137423"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137423"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137423"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}