NASCAR: 2013 Championship Contenders Countdown — #11. Greg Biffle

2012 Review:
Greg Biffle's 2012 season can be best described as simply "solid". Highlights include wins at Texas in the spring and Michigan in the summer. Biffle also enjoyed the best average finish over the course of a season in his career and tied his career mark for top ten finishes at 21.

Most impressively, the No.16 team led the points for a total of 14 race weekends, including an 11 race stretch from early March to early June. Biffle also retook the points lead for the three races leading up to the end of NASCAR's regular season.

However, the team fell to fifth once points were reset at the beginning of the Chase, and after beginning the post-season with three straight finishes outside the top ten, Biffle found himself ranked 11th and out of championship contention.

The No.16 rebounded, though, finishing 2012 off with six top tens in the final seven races, resulting in a fifth place points finish. This marked the third time in his career that Biffle ended a Sprint Cup season ranked within the overall top five.


2013 Preview:
Matt Puccia returns to the pit box, keeping together a pairing of driver and crew chief that has been together since mid-2011.

It's obvious Biffle and Puccia are a combination that works; the No.16 team's fifth place finish to the season was a vast improvement over a 16th place ranking in 2011. Puccia replaced Greg Irwin as crew chief after the Kentucky race that year.

Biffle is difficult to gauge. He can dominate races, such as in the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte where he led 204 out of 400 laps — he went on to finish 3rd. He's also prone to disappearing acts, such as a six race stretch between the fall Bristol and Dover races where he recorded finishes in the teens five times.

Over the course of ten full seasons in the Sprint Cup Series, Biffle has five finishes within the top ten in points. He also has five finishes outside the top ten.

Furthermore, he lost a valuable teammate, and by extent a great source of sharable data in Matt Kenseth. Kenseth, known for being the epitome of consistency, left in the offseason for Joe Gibbs Racing, and has been replaced by rookie driver Ricky Stenhouse, Jr.


2013 Pediction:
There is no doubt that Greg Biffle is a wheelman, and as far as I'm concerned, one of the more underrated talents in the garage. But he's also plagued by inconsistency, which keeps him from climbing over the hump.

Also, with Edwards in recovery mode and Stenhouse needing some time to become acclimated to both the cars and competition of NASCAR's top series, Biffle's team might have to fend for themselves, so to speak, more often than usual early on.

Overall, I expect an up and down year, with the No.16 team running up front at tracks where they normally excel —larger and higher banked ovals — while struggling at other points of the season. That's why it's hard, despite his talent and the flashes of brilliance his team showed over the course of last year, to put him any higher than 11th.

NASCAR: 2013 Championship Contenders Countdown — #12. Carl Edwards

2012 Review:
Carl Edwards suffered easily the worst season of his career in 2012, logging zero wins and career lows in top fives, top tens, and average finish in eight full seasons competing in NASCAR's top series.

For the most part, Edwards was an afterthought on the racetrack, leading only 254 laps over the course of the entire year. 206 of those came at Richmond in the spring, when a late penalty for jumping a restart took the No.99 out of contention for the win.

To further compound matters, Edwards' long-time crew chief, Bob Osbourne, stepped down in mid-July citing health concerns, breaking up a tandem that had been together since the latter part of2004 when Carl Edwards took over the No.99.

By the end of the 2012 season, Edwards was ranked 15th in points, his worst career finish in the Sprint Cup Series. It also marked only the second time in his career that he failed to make the Chase.


2013 Preview:
If history is any indication, Edwards should be poised for a rebound from last year's disappointing performance.

Over the course of his career, Edwards has finished 3rd, 12th, 9th, 2nd, 11th, 4th, 2nd, and 15th in points. Based on the pattern alone, he should be in for a much improved year.

A more tangible reason for improvement will be new crew chief Jimmy Fennig, who has experience dating all the way back to 1986. He won a championship in 2004 while working with Kurt Busch and helped Matt Kenseth win six races over the course of the last two seasons.


Prediction:
Together, Carl Edwards and Jimmy Fennig should make a stout combination, based on their past individual successes. Still, it's difficult to discount just how horribly average the No.99 Ford was last season, and that's why I can't rank him any higher than 12th.

Expect some growing pains, some inconsistency, but also some strong runs and probably a victory or two, setting this team up for another legitimate title run on down the road in 2014.