NASCAR: Puzzling change could be huge for Kyle Larson fans

For whatever reason, Kyle Larson is not as strong of a betting favorite to win the 2021 NASCAR Cup Series championship now as he was last round.

Entering the 2021 NASCAR Cup Series playoffs, the clear favorite to win the championship was Hendrick Motorsports’ Kyle Larson, who overcame a points deficit of over 100 to win the regular season title over Joe Gibbs Racing’s Denny Hamlin, and he secured a series-high five victories in doing so.

Larson had been listed as the betting favorite to win the title on WynnBET since he secured his first career road course victory at Sonoma Raceway back in early June. This win was his third of the year.

He maintained his status as the favorite through the round of 16, and he is still the favorite after the round of 12.

Yet for some reason, he is now listed at +225 to start the round of 8. With four more drivers in championship contention, including two of his three teammates, to start the round of 12, he was listed at +200.

So why is he a weaker favorite now than he was three weeks ago?

That is quite the question, isn’t it?

The driver of the #5 Chevrolet has won a race in each of the first two rounds of the four-round, 10-race postseason, so with a series-high seven victories — nobody else has more than four — the fact that he is listed with longer odds, not shorter odds, with only seven of his 11 rivals from last round remaining in the title fight is very interesting.

It’s almost like they want you to bet on him — because if you do, they have made now the time to do it.

Larson has a 42-point gap over the Championship 4 cut line to start the round of 8, and more impressively, he has a 35-point gap over the second place driver (Hamlin). While he is by no means a “lock” to get to the Championship 4, don’t bet on a 2020 Kevin Harvick-like meltdown that keeps him from advancing.

Yet somehow he’s not as much of a favorite now as he was three weeks ago.

From a betting standpoint, that doesn’t make much sense.

Only one of the other seven round of 8 drivers saw his odds get worse from the start of the round of 12 to the start of the round of 8 (Martin Truex Jr. from +600 to +800). Of course, the jumps in the odds for some (specifically, Hamlin from +450 to +350 and Chase Elliott from +1000 to +750) are justifiable.

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But what did they do in the round of 12 that Larson didn’t?

You’re essentially getting Larson at 1 in 3.25 (30.77%) to win the championship, and as an educated NASCAR fan, you can assume that he is going to get to the Championship 4.

That percentage is only slightly more than the implied 25% for each Championship 4 driver, and if and when he does lock himself into the Championship 4, those +225 odds will obviously shorten considering he will continue to be the favorite, not just because of his past success at Phoenix Raceway but because he has been the driver to beat all year.

So Larson at +225 this late in the game is too good to pass up on, and with these odds being longer than +200, they leave the door open for you to bet on two other drivers and guarantee a profit as long as one of your three selections wins.

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I correctly picked all 12 round of 12 drivers at the start of the season. But I whiffed on the round of 8, selecting Harvick and Alex Bowman over Larson (yes, really) and Ryan Blaney. My Championship 4 consisted of Elliott, Harvick, Brad Keselowski and Kyle Busch.

So my recommendation would be to plug Larson in for Harvick and bet on the two Hendrick Motorsports drivers plus one of the others with whom you feel comfortable. I personally wouldn’t bet on Keselowski at this point, so perhaps Hamlin, who also has a win in each of the first two rounds of the playoffs, is a good option for a third as he seeks his first title.

But of course, it’s always easier to bet with other peoples’ money than your own, and I get paid to do the former, not the latter, so keep that in mind if you’re placing a wager.