“If everyone had an equal chance to win the College World Series, the SEC would have had a 58 percent chance of having one of their teams crowned as a champion, and they didn’t even win a game in the College World Series.”
When it came to the rankings in college baseball this past season, it looked a lot like the rankings of college football in past years. It seemed like every other team was from the SEC, and it was a foregone conclusion that the SEC would make noise when it came for the College World Series at the end of the Road to Omaha. SEC baseball fans know that number 1 seeds have failed to win the College World Series in over a decade, but we still had 4 other SEC teams to advance and host their own Super Regional.
Unfortunately, South Carolina, LSU, Mississippi State, and Texas A&M were all eliminated in their Super Regional. Making matters even worse for the perceived power of the SEC, Texas A&M was the only team to win a game in the Super Regionals other than Florida. In a heated rematch from last year, Texas A&M getting bounced by a very good TCU team was anything but surprising. In fact, TCU is the only number 1 seed to eliminate those SEC teams. LSU, South Carolina, and Mississippi State were all swept by number 2 seeds.
Then Florida was bounced without winning a game as they suffered back to back 1-run losses after reaching the College World Series in Omaha. They lost to highly ranked Texas Tech 3-2, and a very hot Coastal Carolina team 2-1. Those aren’t embarrassing losses by any stretch of the imagination, but because of the perceived power of this conference heading into the Road to Omaha, was SEC baseball overrated in 2016?
Well, define overrated.
Did the SEC live up to their expectations at season’s end? Absolutely not. I noted in an earlier article the SEC had 7 teams ranked in the top 12. If everyone had an equal chance to win the College World Series, the SEC would have had a 58 percent chance of having one of their teams crowned as a champion, and they didn’t even win a game in the College World Series. Add to that the poor performances in the Super Regionals, one could actually argue this 2016 Road to Omaha was one of the most disappointing tournaments of all time for SEC baseball. If you define overrated as failing to live up to expectations, then yes, the SEC was in fact wildly overrated.
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presents a different argument. If you go off of what the scouts tell us by the players drafted in the MLB draft, the talent was there to make the run we were all expecting. Of the first 6 players drafted, only 3 of them attended college. Tennessee 3rd baseman Nick Senzel was drafted number 2 overall, and Florida pitcher A.J. Puk was drafted 6th overall, making that 2 of the first 3 picks from college also from the SEC. Only17 of the 34 first round picks overall attended college, and 4 of those players were from the SEC.
Explaining the MLB Draft Day is a whole other series of articles, but in Lottery Round A that consisted of picks 35-41, only 4 players picked here attended college and 3 of them were from the SEC. After that, the MLB draft saw another 6 players drafted through round 2 and Lottery Round B. Add all that up, and that gives you 13 players from the SEC drafted throught the first 2 full rounds of the MLB Draft, which accounted for 30 percent of the players not drafted straight out of high school.
Looking from a talent stand point, if the SEC was overrated by baseball writers and rankings, then the MLB also has the talent from the conference overrated. With such a general consensus of highly drafted talent and team rankings by everyone involved in baseball, it makes a strong case that the results of this year’s College World Series do not accurately depict the perceived talent each team possessed. This gives way to the theory that baseball is simply a crazy sport that doesn’t always see the best team win. Remember, the 2001 Mariners are tied for the most wins in MLB history with 116, and they didn’t even make the World Series after being eliminated in the ALCS 4-1.
Next: Ole Miss Football and that Elusive SEC West Title
Sometimes losing is just a tough pill to swallow, and saying the teams were overrated after a loss seems to ease and justify the pain. The truth of the matter is that the SEC just had the numbers go the wrong way for them. If you had time to watch the games, the South Carolina Super Regional series against Oklahoma State is the only series that looked like the SEC team didn’t even belong on the field. Keep in mind, Oklahoma State is the only team in the entire field that has yet to lose a single game this entire tournament, and they are completely dominating everyone. Baseball is a crazy game, and sometimes you just have to accept the fact that you lost despite having the better team. SEC baseball fans will now have to learn to do just that. We lost y’all. We had the better teams and the justifiably better odds, but sometimes being a baseball fan just sucks.