For the first time since the late Kyle Busch won the 2019 NASCAR Cup Series championship, Homestead-Miami Speedway is set to wrap up a Cup Series season this Sunday afternoon with the Straight Talk Wireless.
In the first season under the revised "Chase" postseason format, there are still three title contenders, although it would take a lot for either one of the two Joe Gibbs Racing contenders, Christopher Bell and Denny Hamlin, to catch Hendrick Motorsports' Kyle Larson.
As the 2026 season wraps up, so too does year number two of seven under NASCAR's current media rights deal, which includes Fox Sports, Amazon Prime Video, TNT Sports, and NBC Sports (now officially USA Sports), with Prime and TNT arriving a year ago when the $7.7 billion deal went into effect.
NASCAR season finale not being shown on USA
When Prime and TNT were added, both Fox and NBC lost races to make room. Fox lost four and NBC lost six. NBC Sports' races had been split up between NBC and USA Network, with each taking 10. But when the new deal went into effect, NBC's tally dropped from 10 to four, while USA's remained at 10.
That remained the case this year, even though NBC Sports' portion of the broadcast schedule has been reclassified as USA Sports' portion, after Versant Media, USA Sports' parent company, split from Comcast and NBC in late 2025.
Of USA Sports' four regular season races, only the regular season finale at Daytona International Speedway was shown live on NBC. The first seven postseason races were also shown live on USA Network.
But the two most recent races at Talladega Superspeedway and Martinsville Speedway were shown live on NBC. Talladega's ratings were up slightly year-over-year, although they took a huge hit from NBC's first race of the year at Daytona. Martinsville's ratings were way down from 2025, which has led to questions about whether the Chase postseason format is truly the long-term answer after years and years of complaints about "win and in" and the Championship 4.
NBC is set to wrap up the season this weekend at Homestead-Miami, although there will be no direct year-over-year comparison. Championship races from 2020 to 2025 were all contested at Phoenix Raceway, while Homestead-Miami's 2025 race was contested in March. Despite losing its role as the host of the title decider after 2019, Homestead did host a playoff race each year from 2022 to 2024.
Leigh Diffey is the lead announcer, and he is joined by longtime commentators Jeff Burton and Steve Letarte. This has been the case during the entirety of USA Sports' portion of the schedule, regardless of whether a race is aired live on NBC or USA.
NBC's live coverage of the Straight Talk Wireless 400 is set to begin at 3:00 p.m. ET this afternoon. Start a free trial of FuboTV now and don't miss any of the action from Homestead-Miami Speedway! Fox is then set to take back over for the 2027 season-opening Daytona 500 at Daytona International Speedway in February.
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