Welcome to the SEC baseball thunderdome this weekend
04/10/2025
By Chris Marler
Basketball season is over. Welcome to the Thunderdome of SEC baseball.
Tiger Bowl Baseball Edition
LSU heads to Auburn to play three games against the No. 11 team in the country at the No. 1 dumbest field in the SEC. LSU has swept three of their four SEC series so far this season, but the only road series they’ve played against a team with a pulse ended in losing two of three (Texas).
This series comes down to starting pitching. Auburn is 12th in the SEC in ERA at 4.72. Friday night, ace Kade Anderson is coming off one of the best performances of his career. Auburn has allowed five or more runs in nine of their 12 games in conference play this season. That doesn’t bode well when facing an offense that ranks second in the SEC in batting average at .328 and can absolutely mash in the top three hitters of their lineup.
Last but not least, if at any point this weekend you find yourself itching to make the joke “I bet the Tigers win” – don’t.
Off To The Plains ✈️ pic.twitter.com/IadlZXW2OI
— LSU Baseball (@LSUbaseball) April 10, 2025
Worst appetizer ever
Festivus is the airing of grievances. Well, consider this Festivus in April. The four worst teams in the league kick off their weekend series on Thursday night. I’m not mad that Missouri-Florida and South Carolina-Texas A&M are playing Thursday. I’m mad that four teams who are playing like they couldn’t beat the local American legion team are forcing me to write this article a day early when I could be watching The Masters. Shame on y’all.
Both of these games feel like when you go to a group dinner and you got water and a salad and then the girl with bangs, who had two margaritas, a queso to herself, and the Texas fajitas asks if you want to split the check evenly. No, Jessica. No, I don’t.
Contenders and Pretenders
There are three very interesting matchups this weekend that aren’t getting nearly enough attention.
- Vanderbilt at Oklahoma
- Arkansas at Georgia
- Tennessee at Ole Miss
The relevance of each series is listed in order, but the narrative is the same for all three – can the home teams prove they belong? Are they pretenders or contenders? Oklahoma was a top 10 team a week ago before getting swept by LSU and scoring zero earned runs all weekend.
Georgia was an offensive juggernaut until they went to Austin. Ole Miss has somehow flown under the radar all season and snuck into a No. 6 ranking. They’re also coming off a game against Alcorn State where they scored a program record 29 runs.
How low can you go?
Missouri heads to Gainesville for three games that no one deserves to be forced into watching. The very stoppable force meets the incredibly movable object. Florida needs this Missouri series like the state needs sunshine during Hurricane season. Can the Gators get off the mat?
Can the Aggies keep it rolling?
Don’t look now, but Texas A&M has won four of their last five games. That includes a series win in Knoxville. It also includes a 61 run outburst from their offense in those four wins. This weekend they welcome South Carolina who has been dreadful so far in year one of the Paul Mainieri era.
Three-game set with South Carolina on deck 👍
📰: https://t.co/fWQHgrOEeA#GigEm pic.twitter.com/QNcYe0bR2w
— Texas A&M Baseball (@AggieBaseball) April 9, 2025
They’re still a long way away from being a postseason lock, but winning six or seven of their last eight come Sunday including two straight SEC series would be a great start.