New for 2020, Spade Racing will take a monthly look at the heralded Cup Series rookie class to determine who’s hot and who’s not. The PRETTY grade: Performance Relative to Equating Team’s Typical Year (its pretty much how well each driver is doing considering their equipment). Here’s how things look going into Homestead:
GREEN--has moved up since last rankings. RED--has moved down since last rankings. BLACK--steady.
1. Cole Custer (Stewart Haas Racing). Best race finish: 1st (Kentucky). PRETTY grade: A+. Cole Custer had a breakthrough top-five at Indy, followed by a break-breakthrough win at Kentucky. A pair of top-tens prior to his first win and a slew of top-20s means Cole’s win was far from a fluke, and earns his spot amongst the powerful foursome at SHR (Custer, Harvick, Almirola, and Briscoe).
2. Tyler Reddick (Richard Childress Racing). Best race finish: 4th (Homestead). PRETTY grade: A-. Were it not for Cole Custer’s Kentucky win, Reddick would’ve held onto his grip on the #1 ranking here. Five top tens (including a top-five) has him showing that RCR is more than just a racing museum with an odd focus on duck hunting.
3. Christopher Bell (Leavine Family Racing). Best race finish: 4th (Pocono). PRETTY grade: B-. The rebound continues for C.Bell, with fourth, seventh, and twelfth-place finishes in three of his last four starts. Of course the other one of those four was a 39th at Pocono, so it remains to be seen if he’s the next Denny Hamlin or the next JJ Yeley. Please don’t be the next JJ Yeley, Christopher—I don’t want you sponsored by the Delaware Safety Commission.
4. John Hunter Nemechek (Front Row Motorsports). Best race finish: 8th (Talladega). PRETTY grade: B-. The PRETTY grade for JHN is pretty hard to figure. On the one hand, Front Row is typically a back-of-the-pack team with limited resources. On the other hand, teammate Michael McDowell is having a career year. On the third hand, he’s a rookie who is still outperforming his predecessor—and why do I have three hands?
5. Brennan Poole (Premium Motorsports). Best race finish: 16th (Daytona). PRETTY grade: C-. Poole continues to be locked out of the top-twenty since the season opener. But his sponsor’s charity got some tv time recently, so there’s that.
6. Quin Houff (StarCom Racing). Best race finish: 23rd (Indianapolis). PRETTY grade: D+. Yeah, its arguably the most-underfunded team on the circuit. Yeah, their main rivals are Rick Ware’s teams and MBM. But when a 23rd is your best finish, you gotta question if the driver deserves the ride—no matter how cool the Mane n’ Tail paint scheme looks.