As much as I love numbers, they can sometimes lie.
Whether you’re new to NASCAR or a lifelong fan, one number is bound to pop out at you 20 races into the 2025 Cup Series season: Ryan Blaney has seven (!!) DNFs.
As many times as Blaney has finished inside the top five this season, he’s finished just as many races in the garage area. As many times as he’s had winning speed, he’s been knocked out of contention early.
Blaney’s latest DNF came at Sonoma Raceway on July 13. Blaney’s 36th-place finish knocked his average finish for the season down to a mark of 18.5 — the same career-worst mark that he notched in his rookie season in 2016.
Yet Blaney is still seventh in the Cup Series standings, only 123 points back of leader William Byron. He’s locked into a playoff spot by virtue of his Nashville Superspeedway win, and he’s been just as fast on a consistent basis as Byron, Kyle Larson and Denny Hamlin, among others.
Blaney fans love to joke on social media about drawing a bath and grabbing the nearest kitchen appliance every time misfortune befalls the 2023 Cup Series champion, but if you dig below the surface, there’s no reason to worry.
Yes, statistics show Blaney is in the midst of his worst season in nearly a decade. Yes, he’s well out of contention for the regular season championship, and yes, his car seems to be on the back of a tow truck just as often as it appears in the running for a race win.
But it’s not 1996 anymore.
I reference that specific year due to the championship battle between Hendrick Motorsports teammates Jeff Gordon and Terry Labonte. Gordon won 10 races to Labonte’s two, but Gordon had two more DNFs than Labonte, which was enough to give Labonte the edge in both average finish and the championship battle. In the Winston Cup era, those two DNFs were the difference. That’s not the case today.
In the modern day, DNFs simply aren’t as worrying as they used to be.
If this was Ryan Preece, Bubba Wallace or any other driver on the playoff bubble that we were talking about, their amount of DNFs would be a bigger cause for concern. But for the top drivers in the sport that consistently win their way into the postseason before it’s time to worry about the playoff bubble, DNFs are just a number.
Sure, Blaney has bled a considerable amount of points by garnering those seven DNFs, but so long as the problem doesn’t bite him at the exact wrong time during the playoffs, seven regular-season DNFs likely won’t impact his playoff run in a major way.
When he’s still on-track, Blaney is one of the best drivers in the field. Since his playoff run in 2023, he’s become a force at the front of the pack, and his penchant for ending up in other people’s messes is about the only thing that’s been able to slow him down.
Don’t get me wrong — seven DNFs are certainly not a good thing. But in 2025, they don’t cripple a season like they used to, especially for a driver such as Blaney.
If the No. 12 can stay on the racetrack and off the wrecker during the playoffs, Blaney has an excellent shot at making his third consecutive Championship 4 and earning a second title in three years.
Blaney may not be setting the world on fire from a statistical standpoint, but it’s not time to panic over at Team Penske. The No. 12 team may as well be at DEFCON 5.
Statistical regression may not look pretty on paper, but the eye test shows that Blaney is still at the top of his game, and it’ll take a long time for him to descend.
A member of the National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA), Samuel also covers NASCAR for Yardbarker, Field Level Media, and Heavy Sports. He will attend the University of Arkansas in the fall of 2025.