While his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate and fellow veteran Denny Hamlin delivered a Knockout punch to his hostile crowd in the stands, Martin Truex Jr barely made the next round, avoiding humiliation. In fact, despite being one of the most consistent drivers, claiming the regular season championship, the veteran’s playoff outings were nothing alike his regular season performances.

As he puts it, the 2017 Cup Series champion “dodged a big bullet,” scraping past the point deficit, making the round of 12 just in the nick of time. More importantly, he avoided the humiliation of setting a record no driver wants against their name.

Reflecting on the veteran’s Bristol night race that restored the #19 team’s championship hopes, NASCAR pundits, including a former Hendrick Motorsports crew chief, gave MTJ a solid chance.

Martin Truex Jr lands a solid playoff chance in Steve Letarte and Jeff Burton’s books

The scene was dark and grim for Martin Truex Jr and his #19 team when the driver got an early exit in Kansas. Despite making the playoff with top-notch performances, and claiming 3 impressive wins, Truex Jr’s hot streak took a massive hit after entering the playoff rounds.

While the driver managed to keep his ship afloat at Darlington, finishing 19th and adding 19 points to his name, an early tire cut on lap 4 ended his Kansas run in misery, raising questions on his championship contention. The 42-year-old entered Bristol with 7 points below the cutline as if he was awaiting the impending tragedy of being the first-ever regular season champion to be eliminated from the first round.

Fortunately for him, he escaped the humiliation just in time, finishing the short-track race 19th as he claimed 20 points to advance to the next stage of 12. Reflecting on Steve Letarte’s comments of Truex Jr being the favorite to win the title if he were to make it past the first round, Jeff Burton gave his take when Nate Ryan relayed the HMS great’s comments to him.

“Yeah, I don’t know that he’s the favorite, I think you know they’ve been so consistent and lately, that’s gone away. They’ve been consistently fast and lately, they haven’t had that. So yeah, but the points that they have with playoff points, and yeah that’s helped them a great deal and that’s where you know you start to that’s where the teams that don’t have those playoff points that’s where those guys are going to have to really step up and perform,” said NASCAR’s “Mayor.” 

Truex Jr survives a nasty bump in Bristol as he advances into the next round

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The situation was dire for the 2017 Cup Series champion. While he made the playoff with 3 stellar wins and looked like this was going to be his year, things quickly got out of hand as inconsistency rattled the JGR camp. Racing on a short track like Bristol Motor Speedway was never the veteran’s forte as he really tried to hang on with the pack.

WATCH THIS STORY: Fans express discontent as Martin Truex Jr highlights career issues in NASCAR at Bristol Motor Speedway 

As the race reached lap 362 of Stage 3, the community survived another scare when the #19 driver got into the wall after a slip from the 19th position. But the veteran quickly regained composure to effectively point his way into the next round, finishing 19th.

During his post-race interview with SiriusXM NASCAR, he said, “Thank God for bonus points, right? I mean, you know it’s three horrendous races, really. So tonight’s battle it wasn’t pretty at all and I don’t know what we got to do to figure this place out. I thought we were pretty good early in the race.”

Truex Jr then concluded by saying, “So tough night but, it all resets now and we can perfectly dodge some bad luck and, get the job done going forward.” 

READ MORE: After Disappointing Bristol Race, Can Martin Truex Jr Mount a Comeback at Texas?