iNSIDE SCOOP: Kansas Blows Up Chase Race

The 400-lap Hollywood Casino-sponsored race at Kansas Speedway was a boon for Joey Logano. It was a bust for half of Hendrick Motorsports, half of Team Penske and all of Junior Nation.

Jimmie Johnson crashed out after a tire let go, and the same thing happened to Dale Earnhardt Jr. while leading on lap 159. Brad Keselowski pancaked the wall and finished down the order as well.

That presents some interesting scenarios to advance into the Eliminator round, doesn’t it?

If Johnson, Junior and BK don’t make the next round of eight, what’s that going to do to the overall Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup? That’s a six-time champ, the guy who broke his streak at five and the NMPA Most Popular Driver winner for the last however-many years and as far into the future as he wants.

That does leave Logano, Jeff Gordon, Kevin Harvick, Kyle Busch, et al, and that is the way this thing is supposed to work, right?

To win the title you have to be in the right place at the right time, and Johnson has specialized in that since 2004. This might be the year he isn’t.  Although, the next race is at Charlotte, and you know his record there, at least in the recent past. Since they repaved it, however, he has been merely mortal, and he won there in the spring.

Junior is the real problem. If he goes out before the finals, it takes the largest fan base in the history of the sport off the table. Oh, they’ll still back their man, but it will be for fifth, not first. Of course, a fifth-place points finish would have been reason to hooraw in the past few years, but that’s beside the point.

The point is, the biggest name in the sport and a six-time champ could be on the chopping block, as well as a popular and sneaky fast 2012 champion. That’s a big hunk of popularity gone, just in those three drivers.

But that is the way the cookie crumbles, isn’t it? Any kind of elimination format is going to break a few eggs before the omelet is flipped, if I want my food analogies to match. 

If it happens—and Johnson is 22 points out of 8th with two races left before the second cut—then it happens. Junior is slightly better, and BK is better than Junior, in terms of getting to the next round.

Logano has a mortal lock on the Eliminator with the victory, and Kyle Busch, Carl Edwards and company are in good shape. Not those three.

That will be the story for the next two weeks, until the final tally is recorded after the Talladega race.

In other words, it’s going to be wall-to-wall coverage of the plight of Six-Time, Junior and BK.