For the first time in 13 years, the NASCAR Cup Series "Chase" is just days away from getting underway. A long-awaited offseason decision to ditch the much-maligned "win and in", knockout-style playoff format, which had been used since 2014, is finally set to take effect this weekend at Darlington Raceway to start the 10-race postseason.
While full-season points matter more now than they did under the old format, which produced some, shall we say, interesting championship results over the past dozen years, we can throw exact point tallies from the regular season out the window now, as all 16 playoff drivers have had their point tallies reset to start the playoffs, based strictly on where they finished inside the top 16.
Joe Gibbs Racing's Denny Hamlin leads the way after clinching the regular season championship even before the regular season finale, having earned a 100-point bonus (25 more than second place) because of it.
Hamlin, whose regular season title charge got a huge boost from his three-race winning streak in May and June, was actually the championship favorite even before that streak began, given just how well the No. 11 team was running early on.
But everybody knows the narrative surrounding Hamlin at this point. He is the all-time winningest driver without a championship to his name, and his 2025 heartbreak simply added another item to the long list of ways he has managed to not win a title during his first two decades in the sport. Can he finally change that in 2026?
At DraftKings Sportsbook, he's the clear favorite to win the championship this year. It's rare that a Cup Series driver enters the postseason with minus-odds, but Hamlin is listed at -110 (bet $110 to win $100).
But are you really betting $110 to win $100, or are you betting $110 to lose $110? Here are the top five drivers most likely to keep Hamlin ahead of the late Junior Johnson on the all-time wins list among non-champions.
1. Ryan Blaney, Team Penske (+550)
Given Ford's early pace deficit, coupled with Ryan Blaney consistently having a bottom-five pit crew, it's impressive that he was able to conclude the regular season with three victories and a second-place position in the point standings.
He also knows how to get the job done when it counts. As much as fans like to criticize Joey Logano for winning the 2024 championship after a 15th place finish in the regular season standings, nobody ever mentions the fact that Blaney won it in 2023 after finishing 13th. With his 89-point deficit to Hamlin now just 25 following the rest, the driver of the No. 12 Ford is in business.
2. Christopher Bell, Joe Gibbs Racing (+750)
If the law of averages is as real as they say it is, Christopher Bell could be on his way to becoming the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series champion. Seven runner-up finishes in 26 regular season races is an all-time record without a win.
It has always felt like, and continues to feel like, that if Bell finally wins one, he could go on a run. We saw it in 2025, when he won three races in a row early in the season, and while he only added one win after that, he was actually the top-scoring driver in the playoffs before the Championship 4, despite the fact that the nuances of the old format kept him out of the winner-take-all season finale.
3. Tyler Reddick, 23XI Racing (+750)
Tyler Reddick is technically tied for second with Christopher Bell, but we're giving Bell the tiebreaker simply because of how badly the No. 45 23XI Racing team sputtered down the stretch, with their 129-point lead, one that once seemed insurmountable, turning into a massive 133-point deficit.
But Reddick is still justifiably one of the championship favorites, simply because he knows how to get hot and stay hot, and despite his late regular season struggles, he's still the No. 3 seed. You don't win the first three races, or five of the first nine, of a season by accident, and another run like that could give him a lead that truly is insurmountable, even if his win drought is now sitting at 17 races.
4. Ty Gibbs, Joe Gibbs Racing (+850)
Ty Gibbs has quietly hung out in the top five in the standings pretty much all year, only really making noise when he jumped up to second with his second win of the year at Iowa Speedway, before falling back to fourth.
Even in what has been a breakout year, there's still a decent chance he is Joe Gibbs Racing's lowest-upside driver, but that's by no means a terrible thing with how good this team has been. And given his outstanding consistency, perhaps he won't need to win five or six races to make a run at the championship.
5. Chase Briscoe, Joe Gibbs Racing (+1200)
Odds-wise, Joe Gibbs Racing's weakest link is actually Chase Briscoe, who himself had a relatively quiet regular season but managed to finish fifth in the point standings after a historically slow start. Briscoe only won a single race at Chicagoland Speedway, but his regular season was actually quite similar to his regular season from a year ago, when he also only won once.
He is a two-time reigning winner of the Southern 500, and he used that win, along with another victory later in the year, to advance all the way to the Championship 4 in his first year behind the wheel of the No. 19 Toyota. Perhaps no driver is in a better position to make an early Chase statement than Chase himself, with the Southern 500 set to lead off this year's postseason once again.
Other notable championship contenders: Joey Logano (+1400), Kyle Larson (+1600), Chase Elliott (+1800), William Byron (+4000)
Full NASCAR Cup Series championship odds can be found at DraftKings Sportsbook and are always subject to change.
Tune in to USA Network this Sunday, September 6 at 5:00 p.m. ET for the live broadcast of the Cook Out Southern 500 from Darlington Raceway. Don't miss the first of 10 races on this year's NASCAR Cup Series Chase schedule!
Add us as a preferred source on Google