Reviewing this year's televised event records the first thing that jumps out, actually it leaps off the stat sheet, is the performance of Tom Meents. The seven-time title winner has a great shot to add to his storied legacy this year if he continues the excellence he and his team have shown all season. Let's start with racing. Looking at every round of competition on Speed TV events this season Meents has a nearly perfect record, 20 wins against only one defeat. For the record Meents' only loss in a broadcast race came back in January when he lost a first round match-up with Pablo Huffaker and Grave Digger at Ford Field in Detroit. Meents' winning percentage in round racing on TV is over 95 percent, which may be a single season record for performance in televised events for an entire season.

It is also worth noting that Meents has not been fattening that record by beating up on just one or two teams that he has a huge advantage over. Actually Meents has piloted Maximum Destruction to victories over 16 different drivers this campaign.

Here's a look at the best winning percentages of Monster Jam drivers in round by round racing during Monster Jam events televised by Speed TV this season (minimum of two televised events participated in):

Tom Meents .952 (20 wins, 1 loss)

Tony Farrell .714 (10 wins, 4 losses)

John Seasock .714 (5 wins, 2 losses)

Jim Creten .667 (6 wins, 3 losses)

Linsey Weenk .667 (6 wins, 3 losses)

Against the other drivers in the top five Meents has a Speed broadcast win against each, topping Farrell and Blue Thunder in the semifinals February 24th in Jacksonville, Seasock and Batman during 2nd round action January 6th in Houston, Creten and Bounty Hunter in the finals during our second stop in Houston February 3rd, and Tom knocked off Weenk and Iron Outlaw in the finals of the January 6th battle in Houston. None of these drivers, who all figure to be top contenders at World Finals 8, have beaten Meents on TV this season. Farrell does have a stadium win over Meents this year in a non-televised event when he drove Blue Thunder to the win over Maximum Destruction for the final round victory at the RCA Dome in Indianapolis.

Despite all of their battles this year in freestyle Meents and Adam Anderson have not raced each other in 2007.

The Andersons will make figuring the odds even trickier this year. Adam has driven his father's Grave Digger all year but will hop back into Taz for WF8. Will the Digger experience make him even better coming back to his truck, or will he struggle re-adapting to Taz? And can Dennis Anderson hop back into Grave Digger XX after not racing all season and defend his World Racing Championship? How close is the icon to 100 percent health-wise? How rusty will he be after such an extended layoff? All of those questions figure heavily into handicapping the field for racing, and the answers are anyone’s guess.

Analyzing the race results from the season is a more clear-cut process than examining freestyle. Since fan scoring is different from city to city the stat picture is a little more subjective. Still, the results provide some interesting trends that could be indicators of how this year's Monster Jam World Finals will go. I look at the freestyle results two ways: the actual scoring from the judges and the placement in each event's final order of finish. The one clear point in what may be some confusing numbers is that Meents is at the head of the class in freestyle, although not as dominantly as in racing.

Again we will compare drivers who competed in a minimum of two televised freestyles this year. First, let's look at the top five based on the judges scoring:

Pablo Huffaker 27.0 average score

Tom Meents 26.4

Adam Anderson 25.8

Tony Farrell 25.0

Carl Van Horn 24.3

Now here's where is can get confusing. With freestyle being more subjective, if you change the criteria to a minimum of three events to analyze the drivers then Huffaker drops off the list since he has freestyled in just two TV events this year. Using three events as a minimum Meents goes into the top spot and Jim Creten enters the top five with an average score of 24.0.

Now let's see who has been the best freestyler based on their finish in the final standings each week, again first looking at the results for all drivers who have been in at least two freestyles on Speed:

Tom Meents 2.3

Pablo Huffaker 2.5

Adam Anderson 2.6

Jim Creten 3.0

Tony Farrell 3.6

Those numbers examine only the final order of finish. For example, Creten has averaged exactly a 3rd place finish every time he has freestyled this year. Upping the minimum to three TV freestyles drops Huffaker off the list. Anderson, Creten, and Farrell then move up one spot in the top five with Van Horn coming in fifth.

Find these stats a little confusing? Then welcome to my world. Yet for me these stats are major factors when calculating odds and trying to avoid looking completely foolish in projecting the most wide-open and competitive event of the Monster Jam season.

So I hope you'll excuse me but I've gotta run. Many more numbers to crunch and trends to examine before I set the odds for Monster Jam World Finals 8!