The 2019 NASCAR Cup series season is wrapping up as two tickets are left to be punched for the Championship 4 at Homestead this weekend.<\/p>\n
As the series rolls into Phoenix for a date with ISM Raceway, Kevin Harvick <\/strong>and Martin Truex Jr.<\/strong> have already clinched their spots into the final race.<\/p>\n The final two spots are filled by Kyle Busch <\/strong>and Joey Logano<\/strong> \u2013 and while they hold those spots now, they\u2019ll be racing against each other for the hypothetical final spot in case one of the four drivers outside of the cutoff win and steal a bid.<\/p>\n The pair is separated by two points coming into the weekend, so look for each of them to avoid pitting before the end of a stage to try and earn some extra stage points.<\/p>\n Busch, however, will also be a big threat to win. Since the track was slightly re-configured, he has been the only driver to win there, taking the past two races in Phoenix.<\/p>\n \u201cWe all know one guy is going to move through on points and we have to do whatever we have to do in order to be that guy,\u2019\u2019 Busch said.<\/p>\n For the four drivers currently outside of the cutoff, making it in on points is possible, but it\u2019s very likely they will need a win to advance to the next round.<\/p>\n One of them \u2013 Denny Hamlin <\/strong>\u2013 is in the midst of maybe his best season behind the wheel of the No. 11 car.<\/p>\n He\u2019s had his second-best win total of his career this season, finding victory lane five times and has also matched his personal best mark of 22 top 10\u2019s in a season.<\/p>\n Between himself and the three drivers under him in Ryan Blaney<\/strong>, Kyle Larson<\/strong>, and Chase Elliott<\/strong>; Hamlin is the only one with a previous win at ISM Raceway, albeit it came in 2012.<\/p>\n He\u2019ll hope to win on Sunday if stage points don\u2019t help him Blaney, or Larson complete a miraculous run to the Championship 4.<\/p>\n Elliott, on the other hand, will need a win at the very least.<\/p>\n The up-and-coming phenom has had a wild, rollercoaster type of playoff season so far.<\/p>\n He won at the Roval<\/a> and preceded to race his way into the semifinals at Kansas before finishing in the 30\u2019s in the past two races.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not sure [if anyone has had a crazier playoff run],\u201d Elliott said. \u201cObviously, Texas was very self-inflicted. I made a mistake that there\u2019s really no excuse for and that\u2019s what you get. You make mistakes, you put yourself in a bad position and that was all on me. I hate that it happened, but it did and we\u2019ll just go onto Phoenix and try to get a win out there.\u201d<\/p>\n In his limited experience at ISM Raceway, Elliott has averaged an 11th<\/sup>-place finish at the track.<\/p>\n The highlight and maybe glimmer of hope for No. 9 fans is that he finished second in this race in 2017.<\/p>\n \u201c[The starts] are definitely different,\u201d Elliott said. \u201cYou can be really brave and sometimes make something work. Other times, you get really aggressive and you find yourself right back in the same spot you started in.\u201d<\/p>\n The remaining six drivers that can punch their tickets on Sunday have a lot to fight for, and it can all be seen at 2:30 p.m. ET on NBC.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The 2019 NASCAR Cup series season is wrapping up as two tickets are left to be punched for the Championship 4 at Homestead this weekend. As the series rolls into Phoenix for a date with ISM Raceway, Kevin Harvick and Martin Truex Jr. have already clinched their spots into the final race. NASCAR Playoffs: Busch, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":315,"featured_media":7356,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[61,148,846,242,158,261,62,14,270,775],"class_list":["post-7354","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nascar","tag-chase-elliott","tag-denny-hamlin","tag-ism-raceway","tag-joey-logano","tag-kevin-harvick","tag-kyle-busch","tag-kyle-larson","tag-nascar","tag-nascar-playoffs","tag-ryan-blaney"],"modified_by":"Connor Ferguson","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7354","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/315"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7354"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7354\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7356"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7354"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7354"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7354"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}NASCAR Playoffs: Busch, Logano battling for last spots while Hamlin, others try to save season<\/strong><\/h2>\n
\n\n
\n NASCAR Playoff Grid<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Position<\/strong><\/td>\n Driver<\/strong><\/td>\n Points<\/strong><\/td>\n Cutoff\u00a0<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 1<\/strong><\/td>\n Martin Truex Jr.<\/strong><\/td>\n Clinched<\/strong><\/td>\n <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2<\/strong><\/td>\n Kevin Harvick<\/strong><\/td>\n Clinched<\/strong><\/td>\n <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 3<\/td>\n Kyle Busch<\/td>\n 4113<\/td>\n +22<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 4<\/td>\n Joey Logano<\/td>\n 4111<\/td>\n +20<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Playoff Cutoff<\/strong><\/em><\/td>\n Points<\/strong><\/em><\/td>\n Cutoff\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 5<\/td>\n Denny Hamlin<\/td>\n 4091<\/td>\n -20<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 6<\/td>\n Ryan Blaney<\/td>\n 4088<\/td>\n -23<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 7<\/td>\n Kyle Larson<\/td>\n 4088<\/td>\n -23<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 8<\/td>\n Chase Elliott<\/td>\n 4033<\/td>\n -78<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n