The NASCAR driver who has passed the most cars under green in 2018 may surprise you

Not only is the Cup Series driver who has made the most green flag passes this year not a member of the Big 3, he wouldn’t even make the playoffs if they started today.

It’s tough to pass the most cars when you’re always out front. That’s the kind of common sense that should come into play when we tell you that the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series driver who has made the most green flag passes through the end of July isn’t Kyle Busch, Kevin Harvick or Martin Truex Jr., the trio that has been dubbed the Big 3.

Nope, so far, the king of passing under green is Ricky Stenhouse Jr., according to NASCAR’s cumulative season to date statistical data. The driver of the No. 17 Roush Fenway Racing Ford has made his way by an eye-popping 1,940 cars on the track, or nearly 500 more than Truex, the high man among the Big 3.

At the moment, Stenhouse is on the outside of the playoff field looking in, trailing bubble driver Alex Bowman by 56 points (Bowman is 15th in points, but 16th in the playoff standings because 19th-place Austin Dillon is locked into the postseason by virtue of his Daytona 500 victory). Yet the number of cars he’s passed suggests that he and his team are doing everything possible to turn things in their favor.

Why has Stenhouse been able to pass so many cars and still be so crummy in the points standings? Part of it is that he’s something of a restrictor plate specialist. Daytona and Talladega provide many more chances than an average race to make passes because of the intricacies of pack racing in the draft, where you can lose spots quickly and make them back up if your line starts moving, or simply swap spots back and forth on successive laps based on how fast each row of cars is going.

However, Stenhouse also has the second-worst average mid-race position among the top 20 NASCAR Cup Series drivers at 18.3 (only Daniel Suarez, at 18.8, is worse), meaning he has to pass a whole bunch of cars in the second half of most races just to salvage a decent finish. Too often in 2018, it hasn’t been enough.

It’s also telling that Stenhouse has a quality pass percentage of just 43.6 percent, also second from the bottom among top-20 drivers (Dillon has a terrible 36.4 percent). A quality pass is defined as passing a top-15 car under green, so Stenhouse is generally flying by back markers and mid-pack competitors when he does make passes, and that’s not a sign of success. Neither is his pass differential of -22, which tells us that he’s been passed even more often than he’s advanced his position, and that’s not good.

In contrast, Kyle Larson has a truly unreal pass differential of 414, passing 1,707 cars under green but getting passed just 1,293 times. You’re a lot more likely to see the 42 cruising by someone than see him get run down, and despite having zero wins in 2018, that’s a big difference between Larson and Stenhouse.

Here’s a look at the top 10 drivers in terms of green flag passes through Pocono, so you can draw some of your own conclusions about how these numbers definitely don’t tell the whole story of a season.

2018 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series green flag pass leaders as of July 31

1. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.: 1,940 (pass differential: -22)
2. Alex Bowman: 1,893 (pass differential: -12)
3. Jimmie Johnson: 1,886 (pass differential: 282)
4. Aric Almirola: 1,880 (pass differential: 184)
5. Ryan Newman: 1,858 (pass differential: -16)
6. Bubba Wallace: 1,792 (pass differential: 42)
7. Michael McDowell: 1,722 (pass differential: -67)
8. Kyle Larson: 1,707 (pass differential: 414)
9. Clint Bowyer: 1,696 (pass differential: 139)
10. Chase Elliott: 1,670 (pass differential: 138)