NASCAR: 3 drivers who could be in serious trouble
By Asher Fair
NASCAR drivers who could be in serious trouble: No. 3 – Brad Keselowski
In his first season at RFK Racing as both a driver and a team co-owner, Brad Keselowski has struggled, to say the very least.
He got off to a solid start at Daytona International Speedway, winning his Bluegreen Vacations Duel qualifying race for the season-opening Daytona 500 and then leading the most laps in the Daytona 500 itself, but it has been a rough road since February.
He could only manage a ninth place finish in the “Great American Race”, though that result, coupled with his Duel result and stage points, were still enough to place him in a tie atop the point standings.
But in 12 races since then, he has not recorded another top 10 finish.
Making matters worse for Keselowski is the fact that he was issued a massive 100-point penalty following the race at Atlanta Motor Speedway, when teardown inspection revealed a major violation by the #6 team at the NASCAR R&D Center.
The penalty basically puts him in a must-win situation in order to qualify for the playoffs, and even with a win, that still wouldn’t guarantee him a playoff berth.
Even though he should surely get himself back into the top 30 in the point standings, which is a playoff requirement even for race winners, there could very well be more than 16 different regular season race winners, and if there are, Keselowski wouldn’t be in an ideal spot in the point standings to get in.
It is worth mentioning that even without the 100-point penalty, Keselowski would only be sitting in 19th place in the standings, so it’s not exactly like the 2012 series champion and the #6 team have been all that strong in 2022. Teammate Chris Buescher only sits in 21st (22nd without Keselowski’s penalty).
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Keselowski hasn’t had a winless season since 2010, the first of his 12 seasons with Team Penske, and he hasn’t failed to qualify for the playoffs since 2013. But both of those streaks could end without an upset win at some point throughout the second half of the regular season.