The NASCAR Cup Series returns to Texas Motor Speedway for Sunday's Autotrader EchoPark Automotive 500 (3:30 p.m. ET, USA).
While Cup cars have already visited Texas once this year, there are a few important caveats to note.
First, this season's previous event was the All-Star Race, which is a much different format.
Additionally, a different tire combination was used in that race than what teams will run on Sunday.
So what does this mean from a NASCAR betting perspective? Essentially, my plan is to combine performance from the All-Star Race as well as metrics from the Kansas race two weeks ago, which is a 1.5-mile track, just like Texas, and used the same tire combination.
NASCAR Pick for Texas
*Odds as of Tuesday morning
Looking back at the All-Star Race in May, Team Penske was extremely fast as an organization.
Ryan Blaney led the most laps and won the race, with Austin Cindric finishing third and Joey Logano coming home fourth.
So imagine my surprise when I noticed that Logano is priced as a +155 underdog against Chase Elliott at DraftKings in their featured matchup for Sunday's race at Texas.
To be fair, Elliott did finish 11th vs. Logano's 17th at Kansas a couple of weeks ago, but that may not tell the entire story.
Logano ranked fifth in average running position compared to Elliott's 12th-best ranking in that event, showing that the No. 22 Ford was actually farther ahead in the running order for most of that race.
Again, there are a lot of uncertainties heading into Sunday's Autotrader EchoPark Automotive 500 at Texas, but I'm having a hard time believing that Logano should be this large of an underdog to Elliott.
The bet: Logano (+155) over Elliott
