While many NASCAR Cup Series drivers who drive for top-tier teams will be on the move this offseason, there is certainly no shortage of talent to fill their seats.
Drivers currently driving for top-tier teams like Danica Patrick of Stewart-Haas Racing, Kasey Kahne of Hendrick Motorsports, Matt Kenseth of Joe Gibbs Racing and Kurt Busch of Stewart-Haas Racing all have uncertain futures beyond the conclusion of the 2017 NASCAR Cup Series season.
While some of their seats are already taken for next season, it doesn’t hurt to look at which under-the-radar drivers who currently drive for smaller and more underfunded teams would, to the surprise of many, likely do well driving for some of the teams that the above drivers drive for.
Some of the drivers on this list have contracts with their current teams that don’t end at the conclusion of this season, but most of them are young and should have plenty of opportunities to prove they belong as full-time drivers for top-tier organizations in the future.
Let’s have a look at these 10 drivers and why each of them has a case to be made for them in terms of driving for one of the NASCAR Cup Series top-tier teams at some point in the future.
NOTE: This list is in alphabetical order.
#1 – AJ Allmendinger, JTG Daugherty Racing, No. 47 Chevrolet
AJ Allmendinger, 35, has spent several seasons in both the NASCAR Cup Series and in IndyCar. While he has never really been anything special in the Cup Series after several solid seasons in IndyCar, he has never driven for a top-tier team in the Cup Series.
Allmendinger started out his Cup Series career in 2006 for Team Red Bull. However, he failed to qualify for the two races he entered that season. He drove full-time for the team the next season, but he qualified for only 17 of the 36 races on the schedule.
In 2008, he drove for Michael Waltrip Racing and Gillett Evernham Motorsports. When he finally made his first career Daytona 500 start in 2009 driving for Richard Petty Motorsports, the team he drove for from 2009 season through 2011, he finished in 3rd place, which is solid since he wasn’t driving for a top-tier organization.
In 2012, Allmendinger drove for both Penske Racing and Phoenix Racing. He continued driving for Phoenix Racing in 2013 before making the transition to JTG Daugherty Racing towards the middle of the season. He has not left the team since.
In his 323 career Cup Series races, Allmendinger has one race win and 10 top 5 finishes to his name. He has also racked up 52 career top 10 finishes, and he has done that without driving for one of the sport’s top teams.
So far this season, his best finish is a 3rd place effort at the Daytona 500, his lone top 5 finish of the season. He has four other top 10 finishes this season and is one of the sport’s top drivers not currently driving for a top-tier team. Hopefully he gets that opportunity before he calls it a career. After all, he is 35 years old, older than every other driver on this list.
#2 – Aric Almirola, Richard Petty Motorsports, No. 43 Ford
Aric Almirola, 33, began his NASCAR Cup Series career began back in 2007 when he drove one race for Joe Gibbs Racing and a few races for Dale Earnhardt, Inc. The next season, he drove a few races for Dale Earnhardt Inc. before making the transition to Earnhardt Ganassi Racing to drive a few races in 2009. Also in 2009, he drove for Phoenix Racing, qualifying for one of the two races he attempted to qualify for.
In 2010, he started out driving for Phoenix Racing before making the transition to Tommy Baldwin Racing for one race, a race he failed to qualify for. He wrapped up 2010 driving for Richard Petty Motorsports before becoming a full-time Nationwide (now Xfinity) Series driver in 2011. he did not drive in the Cup Series at all that season.
In 2012, he picked up where he left off at Richard Petty Motorsports, and he has been driving for the team ever since. He has driven in 232 career Cup Series races, and he has one career victory to his name at Daytona in 2014.
In those 232 career races, Almirola has racked up 10 top 5 finishes and 29 top 10 finishes. So far this season, he has finished as high as 4th place twice at the Daytona 500 and at Talladega despite the fact that he missed seven races with a back injury he suffered in a crash at Kansas. His one other top 10 finish this season was a 9th place finish at Richmond.
While he currently trails a number of the other drivers on this list in the championship standings, Almirola is arguably the best driver listed. He missed seven races this season yet is still higher in the standings than four of the other nine drivers on this list. He definitely deserves a better ride.
#3 – Chris Buescher, JTG Daugherty Racing, No. 37 Chevrolet
Chris Buescher, 24, made his NASCAR Cup Series debut as a part-time driver for Front Row Motorsports in 2015 before officially becoming a rookie with the team the following season. It took him until his 27th career race to finally finish a race higher than 14th place.
But when he finally did so, he did it in a big way. Buescher’s first career top 13 finish in the Cup Series was a win at Pocono. Winning at Pocono locked him into the Chase in his first full season of competition, a major accomplishment for a rookie driving for such a small team.
While many will argue that Buescher’s win at Pocono was a fluke, what isn’t a fluke is the fact that he has definitely developed into a solid driver since then, especially given the fact that he hasn’t had the opportunity to drive for a top-tier team.
Two races after his first Cup Series win, Buescher finished in 5th place at Bristol, giving him two top 5 finishes in three races as a rookie driving for Front Row Motorsports, a team that has nowhere near the amount of resources as a team like Hendrick Motorsports, Joe Gibbs Racing or Stewart-Haas Racing has.
In 2017, his first season driving for JTG Daugherty Racing, Buescher didn’t get off to the hottest start. However, he has since kicked it up a notch, finishing in 10th place at Daytona, 9th place at Indianapolis and 6th place at Michigan over the course of the last eight races. He now has five top 10 finishes in 66 career races.
What’s impressive is the fact that Buescher has pulled this off in just his second full-time season, and he has done it driving for JTG Daugherty Racing. While he may still need a little bit more development, he definitely deserves a ride with a better team at some point.
#4 – Landon Cassill, Front Row Motorsports, No. 34 Ford
Landon Cassill, 28, has switched teams frequently throughout his NASCAR Cup Series career, which began back in 2010. However, he did not become a full-time driver until the following season.
In 2010, Cassill drove for Phoenix Racing, TRG Motorsports and Gunselman Motorsports before driving for Germain Racing and Phoenix Racing the following season in his first full season, although he still did miss four of the 36 races on the 2011 schedule.
After 2011, Cassill has never driven for more than one team in a season. However, he has still changed teams quite frequently. In 2012, he drove for BK Racing before making the transition to Circle Sport in 2013.
In 2014, Cassill drove for Hillman Racing and then continued with the team in 2015 after it was renamed to Hillman Smith Motorsports. In 2016, he started driving for Front Row Motorsports, which is the team he currently drives for. Because of this, he finally has some sort of stability within the Cup Series.
In most ways, Cassill’s statistics do not reflect those of a great driver. He has driven 247 career races and has just one top 10 finish. In fact, his win drought of 247 races is longer than all other active drivers’ win droughts.
However, he has driven for lots of underfunded teams, so it’s amazing that he has produced the small amount of solid results that he has. While he does only have on career top 10 finish, it was far better than a 10th place effort, which we’ll get into more below.
He also has four other finishes of either 11th or 12th place, so he’s been solid given the fact that he has never driven for a great team throughout his Cup Series career.
Now let’s get back to his lone top 10 finish. Not only was it better than a 10th place finish; in fact, it was even better than a 5th place effort. Cassill’s lone top 10 and top 5 finish came back in 2014 at Talladega, and he finished the race in 4th place as a Hillman Racing driver.
While that 4th place finish really is the only highlight of Cassill’s career, the fact that he even has that highlight given how many small teams he has driven for shows that he could benefit from being given a ride with a top-tier organization. He certainly deserves a shot, especially since that 4th place came when he was a Hillman Racing driver.
#5 – Matt DiBenedetto, Go FAS Racing, No. 32 Ford
Matt DiBenedetto, 26, is a relatively new driver in the Cup Series. He came to the Cup Series in 2015 as a full-time driver, and he has driven full-time in the series ever since. In his first two seasons, he drove for BK Racing, and he now drives for Go FAS Racing.
It took him until his 41st career race to finally finish higher than 18th place, but he did so with a 6th place finish at Bristol last season, which is his career-high finish to this day. While he hasn’t been able to better than finish yet, he has still been improving as an overall driver.
He added two more top 9 finishes in the 47 races that followed that, as he finished in 9th place in the Daytona 500 and 8th place at Indianapolis this season, giving him three top 9 finishes in 48 races, which is respectable given the fact that he has driven for the small teams he has driven for.
At this point, DiBenedetto has earned three top 9 results over the course of the last 52 races, and he has earned these results driving for BK Racing and Go FAS Racing. Given the fact that his career-high finish is already a 6th place finish driving for the teams he has driven for, he could definitely shine as a driver for a top-tier team if given the chance.
#6 – Ty Dillon, Germain Racing, No. 13 Chevrolet
As a NASCAR Cup Series rookie driving for Germain Racing this season, Ty Dillon, 25, has flown under the radar, especially with rookies Erik Jones and Daniel Suarez becoming regular contenders to win races. But of the small-team drivers, of which most are listed in this article, he is the highest in the championship standings out of all of them up in 24th place.
Dillon has driven in 42 career Cup Series races, 24 of which this season. In 2014 and 2015, he drove some races for Richard Childress Racing. Last season, he drove some races for Leavine Family Racing and Stewart-Haas Racing. While he has yet to finish a race in the top 10, he has consistently brought his car home in one piece, which is impressive given the fact that he drives for just a one-car team.
So far in his 42-race Cup Series career, he has failed to finish just four races, with three of those DNF’s coming this season. In the 21 of 24 races that he has finished so far this season, he has finished in the top 20 on 15 different occasions, which is impressive for a rookie, especially given the fact that he is driving for Germain Racing.
In several races, including those at Talladega, Dover and Daytona, he has been a factor late to potentially earn his first career victory. However, despite establishing himself as a race contender, he hasn’t been able to pull through yet and has only finished as high as 13th place at Talladega.
Still, for Dillon, a rookie driver driving for one-car Germain Racing, to be racking up consistently mediocre results means that he could be a star if given the opportunity to shine in a full-time driving role for a top-tier organization. He may get the chance to drive for Richard Childress Racing, which is one of the sport’s larger teams, with the seat of Paul Menard’s #27 Chevrolet open next season. That would be a start.
#7 – Michael McDowell, Leavine Family Racing, No. 95 Chevrolet
Michael McDowell, 32, like many of the other drivers already mentioned in this article, has driven for team after team after team in his NASCAR Cup Series career. In his nine previous seasons in the sport, he has never driven a full season, although that appears as though it will change this season, as he hasn’t missed any of the 24 races already contested in 2017.
In 2008, McDowell drove and finished a bunch of races for Michael Waltrip Racing before driving for Prism Motorsports and Tommy Baldwin Racing the following season and failing to finish a single race in eight attempts. In 2010, he also drove for Prism Motorsports in addition to Whitney Motorsports, and he only finished one of the 24 races he contested that season.
In 2011, McDowell finished just two of the 31 races he drove for HP Racing, but he did finish the one race he drove in relief of Kyle Busch at Joe Gibbs Racing. The following season, he drove for Phil Parsons Racing and finished just five of the 30 races he contested.
The story of not finishing races continued for McDowell in 2013 when he drove for Phil Parsons Racing, Front Row Motorsports and Phoenix Racing, and he finished just seven of the 33 races he contested. However, he did secure his first career top 10 finish with a 9th place finish at the Daytona 500 driving for Phil Parsons Racing.
Finally in 2014, McDowell got himself a ride with the team he still drives for today, and that team is Leavine Family Racing, where he has not had any real issues finishing races on a regular basis. He recently recorded his career-high Cup Series finish driving for this team at Daytona with a 4th place effort.
McDowell has four other top 10 finishes in his 237 career Cup Series races, three of which coming since he began driving for his current team. However, the only top 10 finish that he has had this season is that 4th place finish at Daytona.
Also, so far this season, no driver has completed more laps and more miles than McDowell has. Now that he has a car that he can actually finish races with, he hasn’t been a bad driver at all. Now imagine what would happen if he actually drove for a top-tier organization in a faster and even more consistent car.
#8 – David Ragan, Front Row Motorsports, No. 38 Ford
David Ragan, 31, has spent some seasons driving for some solid teams in the NASCAR Cup Series. He has performed well for the solid teams he has driven for, and that’s despite the fact that none of the teams he has ever driven for have been as good as top-tier teams like Hendrick Motorsports, Joe Gibbs Racing or Stewart-Haas Racing.
Ragan began driving full-time in the Cup Series in 2007 for Roush Fenway Racing, and he kicked off his time there with a 5th place finish at the Daytona 500. He drove for the team from 2007 through 2011 before driving for Front Row Motorsports full-time from 2012 to 2014. He drove for Front Row Motorsports in the 2015 Daytona 500 before making the transition to Joe Gibbs Racing to replace the injured Kyle Busch for a few races.
After nine races in relief of Busch, Ragan drove for Michael Waltrip Racing for the rest of 2015. In 2016, he ended up with BK Racing before making a return to Front Row Motorsports this season. In 386 career Cup Series starts, he has 15 top 5 finishes and 38 top 10 finishes.
While he hasn’t finished in the top 5 in over two seasons since when he was the replacement driver for Kyle Busch at the top-tier Joe Gibbs Racing organization, Ragan does have two top 10 finishes in the last 15 races with a 10th place finish at Talladega and a 6th place finish at Daytona, the two tracks where his two career victories have come at. As evidenced during his time replacing Busch at Joe Gibbs Racing especially, Ragan could shine if given the chance to drive for a top-tier team.
#9 – Reed Sorenson, Premium Motorsports, No. 15 Toyota
In 13 seasons as NASCAR Cup Series driver, Reed Sorenson, 31, has only ever been a full-time driver in five of them, most recently in 2014. He hasn’t had a ride with a solid team since 2009 when he drove for Richard Petty Motorsports following three seasons of driving for a somewhat solid Chip Ganassi Racing team.
Have a look at all of these teams he has driven for since the 2010. It’s no wonder he hasn’t finished in the top 10 in over seven years. In 2010, he drove for Braun Racing and Team Red Bull. The following season, he drove for Robby Gordon Motorsports.
In 2012, he drove for Turn One Racing, FAS Lane Racing, Humphrey Smith Racing and Go Green Racing. The following season, he drove for Leavine Family Racing before getting another full-time ride in 2014 with Tommy Baldwin Racing.
The changes do not stop there. In 2015, he drove for Team Xtreme Racing, RAB Racing, Front Row Motorsports and Premium Motorsports before driving for Hillman Racing and Premium Motorsports again 2016. So far in 2017, he has only driven for Premium Motorsports.
Sorenson has driven in 280 career races and has finished in the top 10 a total of 15 times, with five of those 15 top 10 finishes being top 5 finishes. All but one of those top 10 finishes came in his seasons driving for Chip Ganassi Racing and Richard Petty Motorsports, so he has proven that he can do well driving for solid teams. Now let’s hope he gets a chance to perform for a top-tier team.
#10 – Cole Whitt, TriStar Motorsports, No. 72 Chevrolet
Of the 10 drivers on this list, Cole Whitt, 26, is without a doubt the least proven. He has driven off and on in the NASCAR Cup Series since 2011, but only in 2014 did he really start driving in pretty much every race each season, with 2016 being an exception, as he only drove in 26 of the 36 events last season.
Whitt, like Reed Sorenson, who was discussed on the previous slide, has driven for all kinds of small and underfunded teams. In 2011, he drove two races for Team Red Bull, and in 2012, he drove three races for Turn One Racing and two races for Circle Sport.
Then in 2013, he drove seven races for Swan Racing Company before driving full-time in 2014 for Swan Racing (renamed from Swan Racing Company) and BK Racing. In 2015, he continued driving full-time for Front Row Motorsports before driving the majority of 2016’s races for Premium Motorsports. He is currently in his first season as the full-time driver for TriStar Motorsports.
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Whitt’s statistics over the course of his 136 career Cup Series races have really not been great. In fact, he has never finished a single race in the top 10, although he has come close with a 12th place finish at Indianapolis this season, an 11th place finish at Daytona last season and a 13th place finish at Talladega in 2015. He also has several other top 20 finishes.
Whitt has switched teams at least once per season throughout his Cup Series career, and he’s never driven for a team that has anywhere near the resources that top-tier teams like Hendrick Motorsports, Joe Gibbs Racing or Stewart-Haas Racing have to offer. The fact that he has even come close to finishing in the top 10 driving for some of the teams he has driven for shows that he should be given a shot to drive for a top-tier team at some point.
Do you think any of these 10 drivers will ever end up driving for top-tier NASCAR Cup Series teams? If so, which ones do you see doing so? Which one of these 10 drivers do you think is most deserving of a ride with a top-tier team?
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