DraftKings NASCAR DFS Picks for Talladega: Fantasy NASCAR Strategy and Picks for the YellaWood 500

The final superspeedway race of the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series season takes place today at Talladega Superspeedway.

Since Talladega is a drafting track, the ideal DFS cash game strategy at these tracks is always to take non-backmarkers starting in the back. That means we’ll be looking to roster guys like Carson Hocevar, Corey LaJoie, and Ricky Stenhouse Jr, , among others, in our cash-game lineups.

Any driver starting in the back half of the field is worthy of being in some percentage of a multi-entry portfolio, but the big names starting in the half of the field tend to be too chalky. Those include Chase Elliott, Ross Chastain, and most recent superspeedway winner Christopher Buescher as drivers I project to be over-rostered.

As such, I’ll just give my low-percentage tournament picks this week. Drafting races, which have a large degree of uncertainty, present the perfect opportunity to get contrarian, which is why I’ll just be focusing on the lower-owned plays for tournament picks.

Before we jump into my picks, don’t forget all my NASCAR projections can be found in the NASCAR Models on FantasyLabs, complete with floor, ceiling, median, and ownership projections.

Let’s not skip the best part — my Perfect% metric — a metric that tells you how often certain racers appear in the optimal lineup when running 10,000 race simulations.

And don’t forget about the tools that FantasyLabs has to offer, like our Lineup Optimizer to effortlessly create up to 300 lineups, or our Lineup Builder if you like to hand-build your lineups.

Here are my NASCAR DFS picks for Sunday’s YellaWood 500 at Talladega Superspeedway.

 

Talladega DraftKings DFS Tournament Picks

Justin Haley ($6000): With the drivers I mentioned in cash games, as well as the big name chalky plays I mentioned above, that leaves room for Justin Haley to go under-utilized in tournaments. That’s especially true with Haley’s teammate starting one position behind him.

Haley is a premier superspeedway racer who has multiple wins in the Xfinity Series, and who’s come close in the Cup Series while with Kaulig. I project him to be rostered on about 21% of lineups compared to 25% optimally, so if you want a little leverage, I don’t mind playing him around 30%.

Daniel Suarez ($8100): Suarez is known for struggling at superspeedway races, but he has improved in recent starts.

And by starting back in 28th, he doesn’t even need to be great. He just needs to come home with a top-10 finish, something he’s done three times in five drafting races so far this year.

Ty Dillon and Chandler Smith ($5000 and $5300): These two drivers are both likely to be under-rostered as smaller names starting in the 30s while still being in raceable equipment.

It’s pretty clear Hocevar, LaJoie, Stenhouse, Chastain, and Allmendinger will draw the bulk of the usage from drivers starting outside the top 30, leaving Dillon and Smith in too few lineups compared to their optimal chances.

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Talladega DraftKings DFS Tournament Paul Menard Pick of the Week

Harrison Burton ($5600): With bigger names such as Ty Gibbs and Alex Bowman sandwiching Burton in the starting order, you can bet Burton will be the driver to be left off far too many lineups.

Ford has been the dominant manufacturer at these races, which should benefit Burton. Burton has found himself up near the front of these races enough that it wouldn’t be a total surprise if he does at the end of this one. At just 5% projected usage, I have him optimally projected for just over 10%, so if you want to go up to around 15%, that’s a smart leverage play given that he starts in the back half of the field.