Kyle Larson becomes NASCAR's most deserving undeserving champion

Kyle Larson, despite not winning a race since May, scored more points than any of the other 35 full-time NASCAR Cup Series drivers this year.

For a sport whose fanbase insists on full-season points being used to crown champions, something that had only happened eight times in the first 21 seasons of Cup Series playoffs and hadn't actually happened since Larson dominated the 2021 season and won the title, you'd think Sunday's race at Phoenix Raceway would have been a sort of redemption.

What better story than the full-season points champion actually winning a championship to cap off a season that has produced more playoff-related complaints than ever before? It certainly would have given Twitter something to laugh about.

Instead, Sunday's race ironically proved just how huge of a steaming pile of hot you-know-what NASCAR's playoff format has become.

Kyle Larson sneaks away with championship, Denny Hamlin robbed

NASCAR wants Game 7 moments. They want it to come down to the wire. I am, and always have been, the first one to admit that there are no rules, written or unwritten, that state that "playoffs must only be used in stick and ball sports, not motorsports". Everyone operates under the same format. By definition, you can't suggest it's "unfair".

The difference is that NASCAR is unnecessarily willing to manufacture their Game 7 moments whenever they don't come naturally, whereas in other sports, sports which feature one-on-one matchups in the postseason rather than the entire field competing against each other each week, it (usually) happens naturally.

I'm not even talking about the Championship 4, which was in its 12th (and possibly final) year and has produced some really cool moments – many of which naturally – over the years.

I'm talking about the fact that, with just over two laps to go, NASCAR threw a caution flag for the very issue that was not worthy of a caution flag on several other occasions throughout the race.

When William Byron had a tire go down and made contact with the wall as Denny Hamlin was pulling away from the field, NASCAR didn't hesitate.

But how many times earlier in the race, a race featuring historically terrible tire wear, had they simply let the affected drivers get into the pits?

Funny thing, too, is how the race leader, the driver with the most wins this season, and the driver well on his way to a 61st career victory and first career championship, is also the guy suing NASCAR.

Interesting how that particular incident warranted the yellow, when so many Goodyear tire issues beforehand were allowed to unfold with no interference from race control. Debris is only debris when it's convenient for it to be debris. Carl Edwards knows that all too well.

I don't think NASCAR was ever going to hand him the trophy if they could help it. The No. 24 car simply gave them a convenient excuse to try something. And it worked.

Isn't the FBI in the process of investigating illegal activity when it comes to manipulating certain outcomes of certain sporting events? Anyway...let's get back to the actual point.

Kyle Larson ironically deserves better

As much as you feel for Hamlin, who had his first championship right in front of him when NASCAR decided to insert themselves directly into the outcome of the race and of the season, you ironically can't help but feel for Larson either.

Here's a guy who did nothing wrong, beat the three guys he needed to beat, and met all the criteria he needed to meet to become a two-time champion. He has earned the right to celebrate.

But even he was subdued in his post-race interview, and his second championship has been met with nothing but criticism.

If NASCAR championships actually meant anything like they're supposed to mean these days, he would have been over the moon. Instead, he looked like a guy ready to go on a much-needed three-month break who had just been told he won a free turkey for Thanksgiving.

In the sense that everyone plays by the same rules, Larson earned it.

But the idea of how one can "earn" something supposedly so prestigious under a set of rules that allows for a champion to go six months without winning and lead zero laps in a championship-winning race, after NASCAR effectively hung the dominant driver out to dry with a nonsensical call, is something that needs to be revisited.

I don't think there is one clear answer, especially when you consider, once again, that this is the very guy who literally led the series in that supposedly all-important category of total points.

Should the playoff format change? Should overtime rules change? Should the points format change so that full-season points would actually reward the best drivers, rather than those who ride around eighth staying out of trouble? Should stage racing be abolished so running fifth instead of seventh in the middle of some random March race doesn't affect the championship?

The playoff format almost seems certain to change, with the championship, at the very least, becoming more than one race long. Whether it's a 3-3-4 playoff format, a 10-race playoff format like from 2004 to 2013, or a full-season points format, I'm not sure. But change feels inevitable.

As for the overtime rules, simply close the pits during overtime unless someone needs emergency service for fuel. I'm not trying to absolve the No. 11 team of any blame here for taking four tires, and I'm not trying to take any credit away from the No. 5 team for the call they made to take two.

But this would, to some extent, eliminate the roulette wheel aspect that whittles the meaning of a 36-race championship down to two laps of a completely jumbled-up field.

I do think NASCAR fans are going to find ways to complain regardless. NASCAR will be criticized no matter what they do. I think we've seen that today, specifically, because Larson led all drivers in full-season points, yet no one is happy he actually won the championship.

But among the many black eyes NASCAR has endured over the years, this particular example of "entertainment over sport" might just be the worst.

I'll admit it; the IndyCar fan in me is still somewhat amused that NASCAR's champion struggled to keep an open-wheel car pointed in the right direction for more than a few laps at a time this past May. I know it sounds petty, but it was kind of refreshing to see a certain contingent of NASCAR fans finally figure out that IndyCar isn't some minor league series.

But that doesn't change the fact that Larson is, for all intents and purposes, still one of the best drivers in the world.

Yet today, NASCAR effectively turned him into a Walmart Chick Hicks, when he never signed up to play the villain. And the worst part about it is they took pride in doing so.

Good thing they like what they're seeing, at least.