2025 NASCAR Cup Prediction: Fade Logano, Ride Reddick

.@NASCAR tells @BobPockrass that it’s keeping the Cup Series playoff format the same for 2025, but it will evaluate changes for the future. pic.twitter.com/Rb7M5RYUmJ

— Adam Stern (@A_S12) January 27, 2025

Kyle Larson is currently the NASCAR odds favorite to win his second championship at +500, but with many hot on his trail. Will Larson make good on those odds? Will Denny Hamlin finally win his elusive first championship? Or will it be someone new, entirely?

We will break it all down with our NASCAR best bet for the 2025 Cup Series Championship.

Who Will Win the 2025 NASCAR Cup?

1. Chances For Past Champions

With the retirement of Martin Truex Jr. and Kevin Harvick in the last two years, only five past Ci[ series champions remain: The aforementioned Larson, Chase Elliott, two-time champ Kyle Busch, Ryan Blaney and defending champion Joey Logano.

Busch quite frankly looked nothing like a championship contender in 2024, failing to win for the first time in his 21-year career, per NASCAR betting trends. While Richard Childress Racing showed some speed late in the regular season, it seems far-fetched for Busch to get back to his consistent winning ways. He is a deserving longshot at +2500.

As for Logano, his 2024 championship was a sheer product of the flawed playoff system. He had an average finish of 17th and finished outside the top-16 in total points, getting in after surviving the melee at Nashville. He was even set to be eliminated prior to the Round of 8 before Alex Bowman’s disqualification.

That said, Team Penske has consistently shown its ability to turn things on once the playoffs start, winning the last three championships. Logano should bounce back enough to win at least one regular-season race with better overall results. And once he’s in the playoffs, you can never count out the three-time champion.

Blaney, Logano’s teammate, has a more realistic chance at being a satisfying champion. The second-generation driver has won three races in three of the last four seasons and scored double-digit top-fives in five of the last six, per NASCAR stats.

And one could argue that no one has been better than Blaney in the playoffs the last two seasons, nearly resulting in back-to-back titles. While his +700 BetUS sportsbook odds are higher than Logano’s +900, we far prefer Blaney.

Larson is seemingly the favorite entering every season since his 2021 championship. And rightfully so, as he’s tallied 13 wins in those three seasons and almost certainly would have won the regular-season championship last season had he not missed the Charlotte race. There’s no reason Larson and the rest of his Hendrick Motorsports teammates won’t be near the front of the field on a weekly basis in 2025.

One of those teammates is Elliott, who bounced back in 2024 after a miserable 2023, returning to victory lane at Texas and scored 19 top-10s, fourth-best in the series. The one thing at Elliott’s disadvantage is that he no longer dominates at road courses.

The emergence of the likes of Tyler Reddick, Christopher Bell and Michael McDowell, as well as the presence of aces Shane van Gisbergen and AJ Allmendinger, make this less likely. Elliott will surely be a contender, but we don’t know if he has enough to get the job done. Stay away from him and his +1000 odds when making NASCAR picks.

2. The Best of the Rest

It seemed at respective points of the 2024 season, either Tyler Reddick and Christopher Bell were the favorites to notch their first championship. Toward the conclusion of the regular season, Reddick went on a tear of five top-three finishes in a span of six races, en route to his one-point regular season championship over Larson.

Those extra playoff points did not help him enough, though, as he struggled through the playoffs. Though he did win at Homestead, he fell short in the championship race at Phoenix.

Reddick has been consistently strong in two years with 23XI Racing, and even his final season with RCR, winning at least two races while scoring at least 10 top-fives and 15 top-10s. While best-known at tracks where you can ride against the wall, he’s arguably an even bigger threat at road courses. His NASCAR betting lines sit at a compelling +900.

The expectations for Bell are even higher. Bell’s 2024 hot streak came when it mattered most: during the playoffs, finishing no worse than seventh in eight of the 10 races. But he just could not compete with the Penske cars at Phoenix.

While teammate Denny Hamlin will always be a threat, it seems the guard could be shifting at Joe Gibbs Racing. Bell has taken the reins as the team’s top driver, winning on numerous different track configurations. This reflects in Bell being the runner-up to Larson as the second favorite with +550 odds.

William Byron always seems on the cusp and routinely makes NASCAR news with 11 wins over the last three seasons. Could this be the year he takes over as best driver at Hendrick? His championship odds sit at +700.

While Hamlin’s overall numbers were still there, when he was off, he was off. It is starting to seem he is destined to join Mark Martin as NASCAR’s bridesmaids, never securing that coveted championship to put an exclamation mark on a Hall of Fame career.

As for others, Alex Bowman has not been quite on par with his HMS teammates, Ty Gibbs has not lived up to the hype through two season, Chase Briscoe will likely need a year to acclimate at Gibbs and Shane van Gisbergen will need more oval consistency to match his road course prowess before coming a serious threat.

But we will go with Reddick here with our online bet. Hie and Bell fit quite similar archetypes and while Bell is a bit more well-rounded, Reddick might have the most raw talent in the series and his +900 odds (compared to Bell’s +550) provide a far greater payout.

Bet this pick: Tyler Reddick +900 to win the NASCAR Cup Series Championship

Odds and information are accurate at the time of writing. Please check with official sources for the latest updates before placing any bets.

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