As NASCAR brings the Chase back this season, the new format leaves very little margin for error, especially for those who miss races early in the season. And that’s exactly why Denny Hamlin is sure that Alex Bowman‘s chances of making the Chase are already over. The Hendrick Motorsports Cup star is recovering from his vertigo diagnosis and is expected to stay away from racing at least until April. Missing that many races this early in the season could be a blow big enough to put him out of contention for the championship.

Denny Hamlin gives a stern reality check to Bowman

On his podcast, Actions Detrimental, the JGR driver argues that Bowman’s averages from last year are nowhere near enough to make it to the Chase only based on points.

“It’s over. I think if you took his median performance over the last regular season, you would say that it’s over. If he comes back and runs better than his averages, he can make it. If it’s normal Alex, then I think he is going to have a tough time making the playoffs.”

The only way Bowman can recover from the after-effects of his absence from the Cup Series is through wins and hoarding of points from the stages themselves. As SVG noted earlier, the stage points are crucial for the long run and help a driver stay consistent throughout the race.

“If he comes back and he runs up front, that means you’ve got to get a lot of stage points. He’s going to need to probably win a race; then I think he has a shot. Simply because a lot of points can be made up. He’s going to have to run good and finish good, and there’s a difference.”

While Hamlin is sympathetic towards Bowman, he is more than happy that NASCAR got rid of its controversial playoff format with the win-and-in system. The argument he gives is that even if a driver misses races for 10 weeks and just wins at the Daytona Summer Race, he has an equal chance of making the playoffs as any other consistent driver, according to the old system.

“That doesn’t feel right to me, so I’m looking at the points now. Knowing how awesome it is that we’re looking at one set of points, knowing that 16 is 16. There’s nothing else to look at. I think that’s going to be a dogfight the entire year that I am really looking forward to.”

Hamlin went as far as calling last year’s standings a hoax that did not represent the real situation of the racing.

“Last year, it was just TBD. These are the as-they-run standings, even though it’s after the race. You know that those standings are not real in the sense of, well, somebody wins and all of a sudden you’re going to change your seating and all of that stuff. So, this is much better. Really happy with that.”

While he is critical of Bowman’s performance owing to his inconsistencies in previous seasons, how does his own season look?

Can Denny Hamlin make it to the Chase?

Denny Hamlin did not start the Cup Series season on a good note in 2026. Neither Daytona nor Atlanta was kind to him. However, he did start picking up points from the third race. With top-10 finishes at COTA and Phoenix, it seems like the JGR driver has started to find his bearings.

With a P5 finish at Phoenix, for the first time, Hamlin looked like he had race-winning pace at some point. However, the No. 11 driver stays real about his performance at Phoenix. “Yeah, just the fringe top three to four car all day; that’s kind of all we had.”

“We’ll download and figure out how we can be a little better, but it seemed like a couple of our teammates were really good there that we can learn from,” he said. “Good top five, and we’ll move on.” It is a clear upward trajectory for Hamlin. Based on his performance in 2025, it is very likely that Hamlin will make it to the Chase. The upcoming tracks are some of his strongest ones.

However, being in the top 5 in the regular season is another story. Denny Hamlin sits in P12 currently with 107 points. He needs a lot of wins and stage wins to overcome this behemoth of a gap.