• Ryan McGee, ESPN Senior WriterSep 6, 2024, 09:48 AM ET

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    • Senior writer for ESPN The Magazine and ESPN.com
    • 2-time Sports Emmy winner
    • 2010, 2014 NMPA Writer of the Year

The 2024 NASCAR playoffs are finally here. As the green flag looms at Atlanta Motor Speedway, one question dominates my brain.

What more could you want?

OK, you back there with your hand raised and your threadbare 1998 NASCAR 50th anniversary Chase Authentics T-shirt on, I know what you’re going to say. I want the old championship format back, from when men were men and stock cars were really stock and we determined a champion by nothing more than adding up points!

First, let’s be honest here. The old format wasn’t awesome. Yes, every now and then it was, but there’s a reason we still talk about Alan Kulwicki edging out Bill Elliott in 1992 and Darrell Waltrip upsetting Elliott in 1985 and Richard Petty schooling a much younger DW in 1979. Because most of the other title bouts weren’t bouts at all. Trust me, I was born in Rockingham, and I’ve lost count of the number of times we saw a team celebrating the clinching of a Cup title at The Rock, usually very early in the race — and there were still two whole races left to run!

Second, the old format was last used in 2003. That was four years before the introduction of the iPhone. Beyoncé had just gone solo. Ty Gibbs had just celebrated his first birthday. That system debuted in 1975 and lasted 27 years. The Chase/playoffs era is in its 21st year, so asking for the old system back is like demanding the return of asbestos paneling and downloading songs off of LimeWire. It’s not coming back.

Third, stock cars haven’t been stock since, I dunno, 1966? If ever? Sorry, but it’s true.

And fourthly, can we stop with this idea that today’s racers aren’t tough enough? Martin Truex Jr. grew up being tossed around in the Atlantic while hoisting up gigantic nets full of sea creatures. Daniel Suárez just piloted an exploding fireball down the pit lane at Daytona. Kyle Larson has walked away from more god-awful crashes than Ryan Gosling in “The Fall Guy.” Is that Dale Earnhardt driving bulldozers or Curtis Turner and Joe Weatherly banging airplane wings as they raced to the next track? No, but that’s not fair. That’s like comparing the people who build houses now to the ones who built the pyramids. Also, bad news: I miss Dale, too, but he isn’t coming back, and neither is Pops or the Clown Prince of Racing.

So, instead of bemoaning what we don’t have, how about taking a moment to revel in what we do have? Because that is a smorgasbord of storylines, drama and a collection of racing talent that spans multiple generations.

You want old-school cool? Start with Truex, he who was handpicked by the Chosen One, Dale Jr., more than two decades ago to be the face of his new race team and future teammate at Dale Earnhardt Inc. He’s 44 now and will hang up his full-time NASCAR helmet at season’s end. He damn nearly squandered his playoff spot at the Darlington regular-season finale but still squeezed into the field to set up an into-the-sunset run at a second Cup Series title, a fitting final twist for a career that he has twice saved from the brink of extinction.

The Clam Prince of New Jersey is joined by two other quadragenarians, 44-year-old Denny Hamlin, seeking to finally shed his “Greatest ever to never win the Cup?” shadow, and 40-year-old Brad Keselowski, who has led a revolution that many thought was impossible, the turning around of the team formerly known as Roush Racing. BK’s lone title came back in 2012. A dozen-year title comeback would match Terry Labonte’s 1984 and 1996 Cups for longest span between a driver’s two titles.

You want top-of-their-game modern legends? Look no further than Larson, the No. 1 seed, who seeks his second Cup in four seasons, here in the same season in which he has already won Indianapolis 500 Rookie of the Year. Then there’s his Hendrick Motorsports teammate Chase Elliott, also eyeing his second Cup while he completes his comeback from a disastrous 2023. Ryan Blaney is the defending Cup champ. They are joined by old foe and Blaney’s Penske teammate Joey Logano, who hasn’t missed the postseason field since 2017 and hopes to make a record sixth Championship Four in November. If not for his unbelievable five-overtime win at Nashville, the Artist Formerly Known as Sliced Bread wouldn’t be in line for any of that.

You want scrappy youngsters with ties to racing names you already know who literally raced their way into this postseason? Look no further than Austin Cindric, son of legendary Penske executive Tim Cindric, who finally backed up his 2022 Daytona 500 win with a trophy in St. Louis after teammate Logano ran out of gas in sight of the finish line. Then there’s the past two weeks alone. Harrison Burton, son of Jeff and driver of the iconic Wood Brothers Ford, earned his first win and his team’s 100th at Daytona to earn a playoff spot. Then, just last weekend, Chase Briscoe held off Kyle Busch, who also needed the win to get in, to take the iconic Southern 500. That ensured that his team, co-owned by Tony Stewart, will have a shot at the title before it closes its doors at season’s end. And then there’s Gibbs, grandson of Joe, and one of only two drivers to make the field not via a race win but by consistency (Truex is the other) and desperately seeks his first win to hush those who still say he is only in his ride because of his last name.

You want sleeper picks who actually aren’t sleeper picks? How about Larson and Elliott’s fellow Hendrick Motorsports pilots William Byron and Alex Bowman? Both enter the postseason hoping they had more momentum, but are making their fifth and sixth playoff appearances, respectively. Meanwhile, Christopher Bell continues to be the racer people seem to forget. The Norman, Oklahoma, native has been inconsistent at best — his three wins is second best on the year but his six DNFs is second worst among drivers who started all 36 races — but not only is he in the postseason for third consecutive year but he made the Championship Four in his first two appearances.

“Being under the radar is OK, but only for a while,” Bell, 29, said earlier this year. “I guess the only way to be on the radar is to win the whole thing. That’s my plan.”

Speaking of winning the whole thing, do you want someone who drives for maybe the all-time embodiment for winning the whole thing? How about Tyler Reddick, who won the regular season title by driving the wheels off of his No. 45 Jumpman Toyota that is co-owned by, yes, the Jumpman himself, Michael Jordan? Reddick battled through flu-like symptoms to clinch the title, which reminded a lot of folks of something the boss did back in the 1997 NBA Finals.

You want all of the above? Then take Suárez. At 32, he’s not exactly old, but he’s not young, either. Like Truex, his career appeared to be stalled, but he has revived it. Like Reddick, he drives a car co-owned by a crossover superstar who is legitimately committed to the task, Mr. Worldwide himself, Pitbull. Like those who had to race their way in and also have ties to motorsports royalty, way back in February he earned his second career victory with a three-wide, .003-second photo finish at Atlanta, the track where the postseason begins this weekend. Earlier this summer he married Julia Piquet, daughter of three-time Formula One world champ Nelson Piquet.

So, I have written all of the above in order to write one more sentence. The answer to the question that we started with. What more could you want from the 2024 NASCAR playoffs?

Nothing at all. Racers, start your postseasons.