2025 Cracker Barrel 400: NASCAR at Nashville Odds, Picks & Predictions
Following the Coca-Cola 600 is no easy task. Following the 2025 installment that received a 90% vote “yes” on Jeff Gluck’s “Was It a Good Race?” Pole is damn near impossible.
That is the task at hand for Nashville Superspeedway this week. Coming off of last year’s five-overtime race that was extended by 31 laps and just flat-out embarrassing at the finish, it’s safe to say I’m not overly confident.
Boring is how the books are seeing it, and all we can do is hope that’s the case. Despite Nashville being a unique intermediate track, my handicapping looked spot on with two laps to go a year ago, setting me up to cash a +650 Denny Hamlin outright and multiple prop bets, including a 14-1 Justin Haley T10. Alas, it wasn’t meant to be, and it went from looking like one of my most profitable weekends ever to one of my worst.
Let’s turn the tide this time around and just pray it stays green. Here are my best bets for the 2025 Cracker Barrel 400 and full card for a weekend of racing in Music City.
2025 Cracker Barrel 400: NASCAR at Nashville Odds, Picks & Predictions
Outright: Denny Hamlin (+600 via FanDuel) | 1.4u
Considering how things ended for him a year ago here and being taken out of contention late last week after his pit crew failed to fill his car with fuel, nobody is more motivated coming in than Hamlin. After an up-and-down start to the season on intermediate tracks, the 44-year-old finally had a rocket at Charlotte, finishing with the second-best average running position (5.0) and second-most laps led (53).
That recent speed should at least give him confidence returning to a track where he had the best average running position (4.5) at the most laps run inside the top 15 (99.1%). Hamlin projects second in this week’s IBT Betting Model when factoring in his third-best Next-Gen Nashville average finish and being first in ifantasyrace.com‘s total speed rankings in that span.
I’m betting on the No. 11 team to put it all together this weekend. With Hamlin winning two of the three Next-Gen poles at Nashville, I recommend getting in pre-practice and qualifying.
Outright: Chris Buescher (+3000 via BetRivers) | .5u
Backing Chris Buescher hasn’t always gone as planned this season, but there’s no denying he’s had near race-winning speed multiple times. Sixth in the projections this week, yet somehow 30-1 with the 13th-lowest odds to win, the six-time Cup Series winner is an auto-bet.
He survived the mayhem last year, finishing a rightful fifth after having the fourth-best average running position (10.5). It was by far his best run he’s had here in the Next-Gen era, giving him the 11th-best total speed ranking during that span. Buescher has also been fast at three out of four high-speed intermediate tracks this season, finishing with a top 10 average running position at Charlotte (13.4), Kansas (9.7) and Texas (13.1).
With a penalty setting him back in points, the pressure is on the Roush Fenway Keselowski (RFK) Racing driver to find victory lane. I’m betting that he gets there sooner rather than later.
Seth’s Bigtime Summertime Parlay of the Week
Instead of opting for the T5 ticket on Hamlin, I’m opting to parlay his T10 line with Justin Allgaier’s T5 line for the Xfinity Series’ Tennessee Lottery 250. “Little Gator” won the 2022 Nashville Xfinity race after leading 134 laps and finished eighth last year.
Even more impressive, though, is his runs at comp tracks. He won and dominated Las Vegas with his only competition being Aric Almirola. The No. 7 car started second, led the most laps (99) and was on his way to beating Kyle Larson at Texas before getting wrecked by a lapped car late. He also led the most laps last week at Charlotte (103) and finished fourth.
With 537 laps led this season - 250 more than any other full-time Xfinity Series driver - there’s no doubt Allgaier will be out front at some point on Saturday. If he can just hang onto a T5 position, we’ll have an awesome -133 T10 ticket on Hamlin heading into Sunday.
Parlay Odds: -133 via DraftKings | 2.5u
Tennessee Lottery 250 (Xfinity Series) Bets:
Sam Mayer Top 10 (-175 via ESPN BET) | 3u
Austin Hill Top 10 (-160 via ESPN BET) | 3u
Rackley Roofing 200 (Truck Series) Bets:
Ben Rhodes (+100 via ESPN BET) vs. Jake Garcia | 2.5u
Detroit Grand Prix (IndyCar) Bets:
Keep Playing Palou Parlay of the Week (-106 via BetRivers) | 3u
Seth Woolcock is a five-time FSWA-nominated writer and host at BettingPros/FantasyPros. He is also the founder and content director for In-Between Media. For more sports betting and fantasy sports analysis from Seth, follow him on X/Twitter @Between_SethFF and check out his award-nominated NASCAR betting show, “The Backroad.”