Playoff Stats: Who Can Beat Jimmie Johnson in 4 out of 5?

by Charlie Turner

Thanks for stopping by OnPitRow.com and the Bench Racing with Steve and Charlie blog. The best NASCAR and IndyCar news and opinion, exclusive pictures and video. I'm Charlie Turner. Follow me on Twitter @onpitrow

October 25, 2009 12:55 pm CDT No Comments

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to our RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

Brian France invented the Chase to the Sprint Cup championship. And with that creation, he spawned ways of talking about, and analyzing NASCAR racing that his Hall of Fame inducted predecessors hadn’t dreamed of.

We’re in the playoffs now baby. We can talk stats just like the stick and ball boys do.

It’s just that, things are a little tougher to quantify, maybe.

Sure, you’ve got your driver stats and track stats. Similar track averages and Loop Data.

Driver Ratings? Check.

But I have a new one. I call it the Jimmie Stat. And it goes like this…

How many times in the history of the Chase, has a driver finished in front of the Chase points leader - Jimmie Johnson in 2009 - four times in the last five Chase races?

Why is that important? Well the fiendish 48 team is 90 points up on poor old, second place Mark - the Great Grey Hope - Martin. And Jeff Gordon - the guy, half of everyone, use to love to hate - is 135 back. With five races to go.

I say, it’s the equivalent of trailing a seven game series in baseball, hockey or basketball, two games to none. Because, to have any likely chance to finish in front of Johnson, you’ll have to beat him in four of the five races.

Only three NBA teams have overcome 2-0 deficits to win the Finals.

In the World Series, 11 of the 50 teams to trail 2-0 have come back to win the Series.

The Stanley Cup has seen four teams rebound from 2-0 starts. The Penguins did it last year, in fact.

Can anyone beat the Johnson-Knaus combo in four of the next five? Is this stat even viable? Let me know what you think.

Photo credit: Round girl Jen by BethAnne Heisler for OnPitRow.com

Filed under: Chase for the Cup, Jeff Gordon, Jimmy Johnson, Mark Martin, NASCAR, Sprint Cup Series

Tagged with: NASCAR stats, Round girl Jen

Digg This | Save to del.icio.us

Comments

Got something to say?

Did you know you can log in with your Thunder Lounge account, and have your personal avatar and site link available when you comment at On Pit Row?

Don't have an account yet? Sign-up for free.