iNSIDE SCOOP: Been Here, Done This

Jimmie Johnson leads the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup standings by seven points heading to Phoenix for the penultimate round of the season.

Everyone thinks that this is the year that Johnson will get his Six-Pack of titles. All he has to do is get through Phoenix and Homestead and he will have it.

Where have we heard this before?

That’s right. Last year. And he didn’t get No. 6. Brad Keselowski took it from him after Johnson’s tire issue turned into a wall-banger and ended his hopes of another crown.

Johnson won Texas to take the lead, too, just as he did Sunday. Will it be different this year, or will he have hit the proverbial wall for titles just like Jeff Gordon did?

I don’t think anybody knows, and we won’t until the checkered flag at Homestead.

That’s good, I think. Too many times we’ve seen good battles turn into anticlimactic finishes. That’s not just in NASCAR, either. Take college football, for example. Unless you’re a fan of the Southeastern Conference in general or of Alabama in particular, the college football world has been a same-old, same-old for the past seven seasons.

Losing out in 2011 to Tony Stewart’s run for the ages was no reason for the 48 team to hang its head. That was a once-in-a-lifetime thing, a magical, mystical melding of luck, desire and sheer bloody-mindedness on Stewart’s part.

Losing last year to the brash young Keselowski, now, that was a horse of a different color.

Keselowski had the legendary consistency that Johnson is famous for, and he made sure everyone knew it was changing places. That had to rankle the normally unflappable Johnson, and it must have driven Chad Knaus stark raving crazy.

Even this year, with Matt Kenseth winning seven times and surpassing the 48’s pace on many occasions, it had to be worrisome. But here he is, within reach of a sixth title in eight seasons, and for all the same reasons he’s won the five he has.

There doesn’t seem to be a decided advantage for HMS teams this year, even though all four cars are in the Chase. Three qualified on their own, the fourth was added post-Richmond when the shenanigans just got too big to ignore.

Up until Jeff Gordon smacked the wall at Texas—that place has always been a house of horrors for Wonder Boy—he was right in the thick of the title chase.

Now it’s just Johnson and Kenseth, mano y mano, one on one for the title. Kevin Harvick is a distant 40 points out with two to play, but he’s not going to be a contender unless someone rolls a tire strip out at the exit to pit road and both the 48 and 20 crash at Phoenix. Kyle Busch is more than a race back in fourth, so he’s toast.

Nope, it’s a two-man deal.

Johnson is better at Phoenix. By a bunch, too. His driver rating at PIR is 116.4, while Kenseth’s is 87.0. Driver rating is sort of an all-purpose stat, but it is indicative of how good a driver is at one track or another. Carl Edwards is next at PIR at 100.6, and Denny Hamlin is the only other driver to have a rating over 100 (100.3).

Kenseth is better at Homestead. The only question is, will it matter by the time we get to sunny South Florida?