The good and the bad of NASCAR's newest rules

The biggest message among NASCAR’s rules changes last week was this: Don’t egregiously dump another driver on purpose or the consequences could derail your season.

NASCAR didn’t say that outright but its new waiver rules certainly indicate it.

NASCAR announced that any waiver to remain playoff eligible while missing a race was issued for a driver absence for non-medical (or family emergency) reasons would result in a driver forfeiting all playoff points earned during the regular season.

That means a driver who advances to the playoffs would have their points reset to 2000 with no playoff points added. If the driver makes it to the next round, it would be 3000 plus only playoff points earned in the previous round.

That’s a big hit for a moment of indiscretion if a driver does something so egregious on the track (or potentially off the track) that NASCAR feels it must bench the driver.

This will require NASCAR to treat these situations with a little more nuance as a suspension now carries more weight than in the past. And it needed to. Should it devastate a driver’s championship chances? Possibly. This will be a good test to see if it will deter any driver from hooking another on the racetrack.

The rule also would impact Kyle Larson in his Indy 500 attempt. If he didn’t get back to start the Cup race in Charlotte, he would forfeit all playoff points. That certainly hurts drivers hoping to do the double, something which NASCAR should embrace, but it was obvious last year that NASCAR for some reason doesn’t want to play second fiddle. It's disappointing because the potential windfall of interest generated by a star driver trying to compete in both IndyCar and NASCAR on the same day should make a no-consequence waiver a