NASCAR DFS Playbook Rackley Roofing 200: Top DraftKings Picks

Following the week off, the Craftsman Truck Series returns to action Friday night for the Rackley Roofing 200 at Nashville Superspeedway. Nashville made its return to the schedule a couple years ago and the last two races were previously won by Ryan Preece. Fortunately for the drivers in tonight’s race, Preece isn’t competing so a new driver will get to take home a custom Gibson Les Paul guitar. Corey Heim seems primed for another solid showing while Zane Smith looks to rebound following a very tough stretch and Ty Majeski is still hunting for his first win of the season. 

Friday night’s race is 150 laps broken into 45-50-55 lap segments. So with roughly 100 dominator points available for tonight’s race there is plenty of reason to build your Tournament lineups with two dominators in mind. Last year’s race saw Ryan Preece and Zane Smith start on the front row and both led 70+ laps with 30+ fastest laps. The year before, Derek Kraus started on the pole and led 48 laps but finished 35^th after being caught up in an accident. But Grant Enfinger (started fourth) and Chandler Smith (started fifth) led 39 and 48 laps respectively. Enfinger finished third and Smith finished 13^th. Now as far as position differential goes, last year’s race saw nine drivers gain at least seven positive spots of position differential. The year before saw seven drivers gain seven spots of position differential. So passing can happen, but it’ll help with some cautions.

Practice and qualifying will happen around 4:00pm ET Friday afternoon so check back around 6:00pm ET for screenshots of the practice results as well as updates in RED once we know the starting order and who we’ll be upgrading/downgrading.

This is one of those NASCAR DFS Friday nights where I don’t love the contests. The payout structure in the $1, 20-max Happy Hour is pretty unbalanced and if you aren’t finishing in the top five, you’re mostly just hoping to make your money back. The $4, 20-max Chrome Horn and the $10 Piston are better contests if you have the bankroll to max enter. Otherwise, it’s really looking like an evening to play light with some Cash games and just try to build the bankroll.

Rackley Roofing 200 Practice Notes

NASCAR DFS Driver Pool

Corey Heim ($11,500)

Heim has surpassed Zane Smith and become the most expensive driver in the field this week, and for good reason. He’s had speed everywhere of late. In his last five races he has a win (Martinsville), two runner-up finishes (Kansas and Charlotte), and finished eighth at Darlington and sixth at North Wilkesboro. He also led double-digit laps in all five of those races. On the high-speed intermediates this year he hasn’t finished worse than seventh. Looking at that speed might be the best comparison for this race Friday night. He did run this race a year ago and was running top five through the first two stages before wrecking in stage three. Among the top three most expensive drivers on the slate, Heim seems like the safest for Cash games based on recent results. Update: Heim looked okay in practice, but wasn't other worldly. Zane Smith looked much faster and even after an adjustment, Ty Majeski had better speed but granted, he had fresher tires. Another Update: Heim laid does a good qualifying effort and starts P4. He should be able to get around Bayley Currey and Rajah Caruth who start in front of him and Heim is a candidate to lead laps later on.

Christian Eckes ($10,800)

So I’m going to skip over Zane Smith and Ty Majeski. It’s not that I don’t like either of them. They both have some win equity, but Zane was in a bit of a slump heading into the break and Majeski has seemingly busted whenever I have been heavy on him. So I’ll look to Eckes who we at least know is a boom-or-bust DFS play. Eckes has two wins on the season and six total results in the top six. He’s also finished 15^th (twice), while finishing 25^th or worse in the other four races. So yeah, he seems lined up as a good Tournament play. He won Darlington about a month ago leading 82 laps and had decent showings at Charlotte and Gateway. I’ve seen a few other touts hype him up as their top play based on their own model projections. I don’t know if I’ll go that far since I’m more inclined to trust the consistency of Corey Heim, but Eckes still shapes up to be a top three play as we head into practice and qualifying. Eckes started P13 and finished sixth in this race a year ago. Update: Great speed in practice. Looks like he might have the long run edge over the field. Unfortunately, he didn't have a great qualifying lap but that means he offers us some PD.

Grant Enfinger ($10,500)

Gone are the days of getting Grant Enfinger at a $9K price tag. Enfinger is having a very solid year with GMS as he’s seemingly the team captain now since they’ve brought on Rajah Caruth and Daniel Dye. But Enfinger has two wins in his last five races (Gateway and Kansas) and he was also fifth at Charlotte over Memorial Day weekend. There’s still some variance with Enfinger because he could finish outside the top ten with no dominator points. He wrecked in last year’s race at Nashville, but in 2021 he led 39 laps with a 123.8 driver rating on his way to a fourth-place finish. Update: Not the greatest speed in practice for this price tag.

Carson Hocevar ($10,300)

I'm somewhat lukewarm on Hocevar. Truck looked very fast in practice and he comes into Nashville with four straight top five finishes with some dominator points baked into those results as well.

Stewart Friesen ($9,900)

I’m a little unsure of how I feel about Friesen for tonight’s race. If we’re just looking at drivers that can go out and finish top five, Friesen’s a good candidate. He finished fifth in both Nashville races in 2021 and 2022. Even coming into this weekend, Friesen finished top five at Gateway, Darlington, and Kansas and he was third at Texas earlier in the year. The track fit is certainly there. But at $9,900 how likely is it he can pay off the price tag? He doesn’t really find his way to the front all that much and would need some chaos with the more popular drivers wrecking out if he isn’t leading laps. If that doesn’t happen then he’ll need some PD and he’s mostly qualified inside the top 15 of late. So we’ll see where he starts and adjust exposure accordingly, but I’m not confident he has much “slate breaking” potential unless he can start on the pole and lead a bunch of laps early on. Update: Starts P18 and has shown he can finish well here. Good play overall.

Matt DiBenedetto ($9,000)

Bob Pockrass went a little off the reservation with his pick to win tonight’s race and laid his claim with Matty D. There’s some merit to it and he’s getting 40-1 odds if you want to get some skin in the game. DiBenedetto drives for Rackley W.A.R. and this is their home track. Even Rackley is sponsoring the race tonight so it’s a big deal for DiBenedetto, who is currently sitting just inside the top ten to qualify for the playoffs. There is always the risk that he doesn’t finish but he rolls into Nashville with three straight finishes in the top eight and has had good green flag speed on intermediates this season. Update: Looked a bit slow in the early portions of practice as he was just slightly faster than Timmy Hill. Fortunately, the truck did come around and he tracked faster than Grant Enfinger and laid down a top 15 lap.

Matt Crafton ($8,500)

There are only four drivers priced in the $8K range which seems a little odd. Chase Purdy a tough read. While I do like the upside in Tournaments, I don’t love the $8,700 price tag. So I’m fine going to Matt Crafton who has more veteran experience while also being a little more consistent and reliable. Crafton has finished tenth and sixth in the last two Nashville races while gaining at least eight spots of position differential in each contest. Update: Crafton looks to have a top 12 truck probably. He seemed happy with how the truck performed late in the practice session. His best career finish here is fifth and he commented that he's historically struggled with finding the right line to run here.

Jake Garcia ($8,200)

I’ll say this. I prefer Garcia more in Cash games before we get eyes on practice and qualifying. But I may give the slight edge to Rajah Caruth ($8,000) in Tournaments. Caruth has had really good speed in his truck this year. He’s knocked on the door of breaking the slate, but just hasn’t quite gotten there yet. So Garcia seems a little bit safer as of Friday morning. Garcia was top ten at Vegas, Texas, and Kansas while also finishing 15^th at Charlotte. He does tend to qualify pretty well, but he’s been a pretty reliable young driver and once again has top ten equity on Friday despite having no experience at this track. Update: Garcia was a little under whelming in practice as he ran just inside the top 20 towards the end of the session. The broadcast noted that Caruth, who posted the sixth-fastest practice lap, was top five in both 10-and-15-lap averages. Another Update: So Garcia was actually tracking to post a top five qualifying lap, but he goes loose heading into turn four and it cost him some spots in qualifying. He managed to save it and starts P21. Still has the ability to move up well and score a top ten.

Nick Sanchez ($7,800)

I find it odd that Sanchez is currently getting the seventh-best odds on DraftKings Sportsbook to win outright, while he’s only the 15^th-most expensive driver on DraftKings DFS slate. Rajah Caruth is now more expensive than him and that’s not a knock on Caruth by any means, his truck has shown more speed lately and GMS as a group has been looking solid. But Sanchez still has that affiliation with Kyle Busch Motorsports and he seems to show up with speed every week. As we’ve discussed we really only have the high-speed intermediates to look at when analyzing this race. Fortunately for us, those are the tracks Sanchez has looked best at. He qualified P2 at Vegas and did lead some laps before wrecking. He finished 16^th at Texas after leading 168 laps, and since May he’s finished 6^th, 11^th, 9^th, and 8^th between Kansas, Darlington, Charlotte, and Gateway. His price has fallen off pretty hard and in a race where we don’t have any full-time Cup or Xfinity drivers competing, he’s almost too much of a discount for a driver with top ten equity who has shown DFS upside on these tracks. Update: Sanchez won the pole after laying down a phenomenal qualifying lap. If he can hold off Corey Heim to start the race he should lead plenty of laps and score well.

Tanner Gray ($7,500)

Make no mistake about it, Taylor Gray has been more consistent than older brother Tanner. But Tanner is $1,800 cheaper and is in comparable equipment to Heim and his brother. Taylor’s results have been better, but Tanner still has similar upside to his brother and has more experience. Tanner did manage to finish third at Darlington last month so keep him in mind mostly for Tournament builds. As bad as this season has been for him, there’s still top ten upside. Update: He seems to be lacking significant speed in comparison to Heim, his brother, and even Dean Thompson. Going to slightly downgrade him a bit and leave exposure to just deep-field GPP's. Dean Thompson is likely the pivot for just $200 more, who seemed very satisfied with the speed in his truck. Thompson was very fast in practice but the truck wouldn't re-fire for qualifying so t had to be pushed to the garage to be fixed and he'll start at the rear.

Bayley Currey ($7,300)

Currey is discounted this week after having poor DFS performances in his two races at Charlotte and Gateway. But realistically, he still finished 13^th and 17^th respectively in those two races. He’s back in the Niece Motorsports truck that has shown some speed so this price tag is probably more appropriate for him and allows more flexibility when building lineups. I’d say he has the chance to get a top 15 tonight but our DFS exposure will hinder on where he qualifies. Update: Currey's truck showed up with speed in practice as he was running top five for most of the session. Unfortunately he qualified really well and likely goes backward tonight so he might be worth taking out of the player pool.

Jake Drew ($6,900)

I don’t know a ton about Jake Drew if I’m being honest. But he’s the “nice” play of the night at $6,900 and he’s in the 66-truck for Thorsport so the equipment is among the best in the field. He is the 2022 ARCA Menards Series West champion so there’s some upside here and you’re getting a good ride at a discount. This is a long way from home so we’ll see how he looks in practice and qualifying. He’s 23 years old so I don’t expect him to have the nerves that a younger driver might have making their series debut. Update: Good speed in the 66-truck as we saw in practice. He ran mostly in the top ten which gives him some upside on this slate. Drew starts outside the top 20 so he may be popular tonight.

Layne Riggs ($6,500)

Riggs isn't in the best equipment. Last year he made his debut at IRP and grabbed a top ten but that was with Stewart Friesen's team. He was laying down a very good lap in his truck for Young's Motorsports but got loose twice and saved it both times. So there's definitely a good setup and he has some talent. His dad actually has three career wins at Nashville between the Truck Series and the old Busch Series so there's some lineage to consider as well. Overall though he should improve upon the poor qualifying lap. Riggs starts P31 but might be able to score a top 20 tonight.

Colby Howard ($6,300)

This is a questionable price tag on Colby Howard with no Cup or Xfinity drivers in it. He has five races this year putting up 30+ fantasy points on DraftKings and he’s done well on intermediates where he was top 20 at Vegas, Texas, Darlington, and Charlotte. He even finished 12^th at Gateway a few weeks ago. I’m not entirely sure why he’s underpriced this week, but it’s also not something we’ll complain about either. Update: Colby Howard looks to have top 25 speed for this race. If you can afford the extra $300 you might be able to upgrade to Timmy Hill who ran inside the top 20 which was better than Matt DiBenedetto and Tanner Gray during the first ten minutes of practice. Towards the end of the session, Howard did post a top 20 lap.

Hailie Deegan ($5,900)

Deegan definitely had some struggles heading into the break. She finished 20^th or worse in the four previous races, but hopefully a few weeks off has allowed her to recalibrate and get her mind right. At $5,900 she’s officially the cheapest she’s been all season and this is a driver and truck capable of finishing in the top 15. She does have a little bit of bad luck whether she brings it on herself or not, so there’s some risk. Either way, she’s cheap and should have a few different paths to reaching 30+ points on DraftKings.

Lawless Alan ($5,600)

Alan shapes up to be another popular value play for Friday’s race. Surprise surprise, right? He’s been solid on intermediate tri-ovals this year with top 20 finishes at Vegas, Texas, Kansas, and Charlotte. The only downside is that we don’t quite get the PD out of him that we’d like because he tends to qualify right around P23 on average, but he’s been pretty consistent and he’s in equipment comparable to Carson Hocevar and Bayley Currey.

Toni Breidinger ($5,300)

This is probably too cheap for the 1-truck coming out of the TRICON garage. Breidinger ran at Gateway before the break and didn’t have a good showing. I won’t make excuses for her, but it was a bit of a last-minute effort to get her in the ride and she finished 24^th after qualifying P18. So it wasn’t a great DFS day but her price is back down to $5,300 after she managed to grab a top 15 finish in this truck at the beginning of May when she made her series debut at Kansas. Nashville is just a little bit shorter than Kansas but should still race similarly. And at the end of the day we’re getting a TRICON ride at a cheap price tag. She could be a bit popular but has a path to value if she can run a clean race. Update: Starts P28 in good equipment. Should be a decent value if she doesn't wreck.

NASCAR DFS Core Plays