At the end of the opening stage of Sunday’s Round of 12 NASCAR Cup Series opener at the Texas Motor Speedway, Joe Gibbs Racing was in panic mode. Christopher Bell’s jack failed on an early race pit stop, Denny Hamlin exited his pit stall only to run into teammate Ty Gibbs causing enough damage to Gibbs’ car to retire early in 33rd and Hamlin’s right side damaged enough that it was clearly visible. Then, Martin Truex Jr. was spun after the finish when Brad Keselowski didn’t slow down in enough time.

At the end of 267 laps of racing, 2 of 4 would come away with top five results.

“We had to overcome a slow performance, that is for sure,” said fourth place finisher Christopher Bell. “We got away with one today. We didn’t have the pace to run fourth for sure.”

Bell stayed out to finish third in the opening stage to give him track position back after that pit road issue but was only 20th in the second stage. However, the late race chaos on the final restarts allowed him to take his No. 20 Toyota to it’s 3rd top four finish in his last four Cup races on the 1.5-mile track.

“The restarts worked out in our favor, and we were able to sneak by on the bottom and get a good finish out of it,” Bell continued. “This is one of those days that I’m going to be really, really happy on Wednesday or Thursday, but right now, I’m pretty disappointed because the performance wasn’t there.”

Bell has finished 23rd, 8th, 3rd, 4th in the playoffs but they’re just not executing enough to get the job done. He had a pole in all 3 opening round races but failed to get a win out of it. Can they find the right amount of speed and execution to get back to Phoenix this Fall for a shot at a title?

Hamlin most certainly can. They had damage but it didn’t slow him enough to not be a contender. The Monday morning quarterback has to now wonder what would have happened if he didn’t have that damage.

Hamlin was as high as third in the closing laps before JJ Yeley brought out a late race caution with 25 laps-to-go.

On a day where tires didn’t mean a whole heck of a lot, Hamlin had to see if 20 laps would be enough to make a difference. He was bringing a knife to a gun fight with his right side damage and with Kyle Larson (98 laps led) and Bubba Wallace (112 laps led) running in 1st and 4th, Hamlin riding in third had no shot by staying out.

So they pit for tires. He’d drop to 15th at the restart. He made it up to 12th before Wallace and Larson’s incident with 19 to go. He was 7th on the final restart with 7 to go. He’d gain two more spots to finish fifth.

While he lost two spots compared to where he was before pitting on Lap 244, it was a chance they had to take.

“Today, I thought we had a really fast FedEx Camry until we got the damage,” he said. “Once we got the damage, it just wasn’t as fast as it was before. Still, considering how much damage it had – it was a top-three car. A bunch of carnage happened there in the end, and we avoided it, so we are in a better spot than when we entered.”

Hamlin heads to Talladega +37 in points. Bell is +20. Hamlin now has 15 top 10’s on the season, 12 of which in the top 5 and just scored his 97th career top 10 in the postseason. He’s finished 7th, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 19th, 2nd, 26th, 25th, 2nd, 1st, 5th over the last 11 weeks.

“I really do, but I also know sometimes things out of your control can happen,’’ Hamlin said of his title expectations. “You’ve got to understand that. I say that, so you don’t crash too far down when things don’t go your way and you don’t have the outcome you expect. But certainly based on the speed we show week-in and week-out, absolutely I believe we’re one of the best four teams out there that should compete for a championship at Phoenix.

“But you have to play the game. There’s a lot of work that has to be done between now and then and sometimes things are out of your control. But if they do stay in our control, I believe it’s a year that we would be tough to beat.’’

He’s won almost all the crown jewels now. He’s a 3-time Daytona 500 champion, as well as reaching victory lane 3 times in the Southern 500 and the Bristol Night Race. He’s also won the All-Star race once and the Coca-Cola 600. The only thing missing is an Indianapolis win and a championship.

Is this truly his year?

His 13 playoff wins rank 3rd best. Just Jimmie Johnson’s 29 trips to victory lane during the postseason and Harvick’s 16 rank higher.

Can he march back to the Championship 4 at Phoenix. He has 4 of them already, which is 4th best. The only ones ahead of him each have 5 (Martin Truex Jr., Joey Logano, Kyle Busch and Kevin Harvick).

Another trip puts him with them so long as they don’t make the final round too this November. However, among those 4 previous trips, he’s not taken home the championship in each. Is this his year to do so?

He’s made 3 Championship 4’s in the last four years. Last year he entered with the least amount of playoff points heading into the playoffs than the other 3 previously and he missed the final round by 1 measly point.

He’s trying to do his part to ensure that he doesn’t have to worry about it this year.

Hamlin dominated the Southern 500 in sweeping both stages and leading 177 laps along the way. He thought he had a loose wheel towards the end and had to endure an unscheduled pit stop. That dropped him to 25th. In Kansas, he had the race won (63 laps led) until the final caution sending the race to overtime. He finished second. Last week, he led 142 of 500 laps and won.

382 laps led in the opening round gives him over 14,000 for his career now.

“It’s our year,” Hamlin said after scoring his 51st career NASCAR Cup Series victory. “I just feel like we’ve got it all put together. We’ve got the speed every single type of racetrack. Nothing to stop us at this point.”

It’s now to Talladega to where Hamlin can win at any given time on a superspeedway, but has just one top 10 in his last 10 superspeedway starts give me reason to pause too. However, six Top-7 finishes in his last 10 Talladega tries also gives me optimism. He also has seven straight top seven’s in the Fall race too. Hamlin has scored just the 12th most points on superspeedway’s this season though with finishes of 17th, sixth, 17th, 14th, 26th which is could also put him in a peril position heading to the ROVAL.

There, he’s finished 12th, 19th, 15th, fifth and 13th. On the season on road courses, he’s came home 16th, 36th, 11th, 19th, and second. Last year, he was 18th, 31st, 17th, 14th, 20th and 13th.