coca cola 600 post qualifying notes

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​​Developments during qualifying left us in a very interesting spot.  Based on salary and starting position, I've narrowed down my possible cash game plays to about 10-12 driver targets.  Here's who I'm looking at:

• Kevin Harvick (39th) -- Obviously.  He starts 39th and offers race winning upside combined with position difference upside.  I suspect he'll be near 100% ownership in cash games and I'm thinking you just have to eat his salary and use him because the risk of fading him is just too great.
• Kyle Busch (1st) -- I really want to see how he performs in longer runs during practice.  He starts from pole and the two other guys I feared the most coming into the weekend start much deeper in the field (Harvick 39th and Truex 15th).  So I wouldn't be at all surprised to see the 18 dominate at least the early part of the race and possibly end up with the most laps led.  But, if you use the 4 and 18 both, you'll probably have to also roster three lower tier salary savers.
• Martin Truex (15th) -- As we documented earlier this week, he has really dominated the last two 600s.  There's no way to roster all of these first three guys, so we'll need to see more in practice to make what will be a tough call between the 18 and 78. 
• Chase Elliott (22nd), Clint Bowyer (28th), Jimmie Johnson (23rd) and Alex Bowman (27th) -- All of these guys are mid-tier in salary and offer good position difference upside.  I'll be watching all of them to see longer run speed in practice.  At the end of the day, though, salary considerations may force our hand in who we pick from this group.
• Kasey Kahne (26th), AJ Allmendinger (30th), Matt DiBenedetto (31st), Michael McDowell (29th) and Landon Cassill (35th) -- These guys are the salary savers I'll be looking at.  I like Kahne at Charlotte, but he's also the most expensive of this group at $6,700 and may be too much for the budget.  AJ has back-to-back Top 20 finishes in the 600 in the 47 car, so he's a decent option.  Matt D and Cassill worry me because they are with low budget teams and there's great concern about them not finishing the race.  I really want to have only one of those two on my roster if at all possible.  McDowell seems hit or miss.  He seems to have odd stuff happen at times and that's not good in a 600 miler.  But he's on a decent team now, so it gives him a chance to finish around 20th if all goes well.

We'll be back late Saturday night with a final update and thoughts for your roster construction.  In the meantime, you can tweet any questions @illinisjc

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