NASCAR: Top 3 remaining free agents for 2021
By Asher Fair
Top 3 remaining free agents: No. 2 – Michael McDowell
Despite not finishing a single race in the top five after recording a career-high two top five finishes in 2019, Michael McDowell had a career season with Front Row Motorsports behind the wheel of the #34 Ford in 2020, which was his third consecutive season with the team.
He recorded four top 10 finishes, and most notably, all came in non-superspeedway races. He had entered the season without a single top 10 finish in a non-superspeedway race since 2016, when he finished in 10th place at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
He had also never previously recorded more than three top 10 finishes in a two-year span, much less four and much less in a single year.
In 2020, he finished in eighth place at Pocono Raceway, a season-high seventh at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, 10th in his first start at the Daytona International Speedway road course and 10th at Bristol Motor Speedway.
McDowell finished in a career-high 23rd place in the championship standings with a career-best average finish of 20.9, besting his previous career-highs of 26th (2017 and 2018) and 22.2 (2017), respectively.
While nothing has been confirmed, he is expected to return for a fourth season behind the wheel of the #34 Ford, especially with John Hunter Nemechek out and the team already having the #38 Ford to fill in his absence.