Two years ago there were six rookie drivers. Last year four of them returned for their sophomore seasons. This year the three best are back once again for their third seasons in Cup—and just like over the past two years, we’ll be ranking them here at Spade Racing.
Just like in years past we’ll be utilizing the PRETTY grade—Performance Relative to Equating Team’s Typical Year—as a way to properly rank someone from a top-flight team like Joe Gibbs Racing against someone from a top-flight slumping team like Stewart-Haas Racing against someone from a mid-level operation like RCR.
Here’s where our three guys stack up heading into Road America:
1.) Christopher Bell (Joe Gibbs Racing). 2022 Best Race Finish: 3rd (COTA). PRETTY Grade: B+. Bell retains (and strengthens) his deal over Tyler Reddick with an eight-place finish last week at Nashville. He remains one of the top three in points at JGR as well—Denny Hamlin is a surprising 20th, but will still make the Playoffs because this is the system Brian France chose.
2.) Tyler Reddick (Richard Childress Racing). 2022 Best Race Finish: 2nd (Bristol Dirt, Darlington). PRETTY Grade: B+. Reddick’s slump continues, although he’s still ahead of Austin Dillion in the points standings (by a single point). So this might just be an RCR slump, one that’s been going back to…um, 1995?
3.) Cole Custer (Stewart-Haas Racing). 2022 Best Race Finish: 11th (Auto Club). PRETTY Grade: D-. Cole is on a streak of six straight sub-20th place finishes. Yeah, there’s not really much more to say, other than “could Riley Herbst actually be an IMPROVEMENT here?”
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