How to get rid of the unbalanced SEC baseball schedule...

[CadaverDawg]

I was trying to think of ways to fix the scheduling, and I could only come up with one possibility...

What if we played in series like the ones we play early in the year vs teams like Purdue and Samford. Is there anyway we could play a round robin style 3 team series that would enable us to at least play each team in the Conference twice throughout the season? It would take a much smarter scheduler than me, but I was just curious as to whether or not it was feasible.

It seems that it would make it possible to play more teams, while at the same time preparing us all for post season play and really forcing teams to manage a pitching staff.

If not this way, what are the other options, or other possibilities that would enable us to get rid of the unbalanced schedules where we never really know who the best teams in the league are because we don't share common opponents.

Thoughts?

[Hump4Hoops]

Interesting thought.

Because you can't divide 14 by 3, you'd have to mix and match, and everyone's giving up 1 home and 2 away series or 2 home and 1 away series for a home pod and 2 away, but it would have to go something like:

Most weekends feature pods of 3 teams each playing 4 games. Logistics of who plays when matter not.

Remaining teams face off like normal, and will not play in a round robin against a team they play a normal series against.

Number of SEC baseball weekends would stay at 10. Each team would host 1 home pod and visit 2 away. This works out to 14 pods over the season.

Because you can't play 1 or 3 pods in a week (odd number of teams that way) you're pretty much looking at 8 weeks of 6 teams playing pods and 8 not, and 2 weeks of normal series all around.

Example schedule:

Week 1: @ Auburn
Week 2: Mizzou
Week 3: Pod w/UK @UF
Week 4: ole miss
Week 5: Host pod w/Auburn, aTm
Week 6: @Arkansas
Week 7: @USC
Week 8: Georgia
Week 9: Pod w/UT @LSU
Week 10: Vandy

This example gives us 4 regular home series and 1 home pod, but the next year we could (should) lose a home series.

In total, we play all 14 teams instead of 11, with 2 game series against 6 teams, and 3 game series against 7. Our SEC schedule goes from 30 games to 33.


Rainouts would be a bitch.

[CadaverDawg]

Thanks for breaking it down Hump. Yea, I can see rainouts and other cons to the idea...but I see some potential as well.

For instance, it would suck for MSU to have a pod in Baton Rouge with LSU and Vandy this year....However, the positive would be that it meant you didn't have to play either of those teams in a 3 game series...PLUS, you would be more likely to face a typical Saturday/Sunday guy in a loaded pod, bc for instance LSU and Vandy would probably throw their best guys against each other.

I think it would lead to some awesome matchups, and coaching and pitching matchups would be a chess match. Also, how bad ass would it be to have a pod at Dudy Noble with LSU and South Carolina for example? Could you imagine the crowds that would show up for a pod like that? You would probably have a lot more road fans as well which would help overall attendance.

I think it would be fun, if nothing else.