SEC Baseball Weekend: Derek Curiel impresses
04/17/2025
By Chris Marler
In the SEC, underwhelming weekends are hard to come by.
This is a league that has produced the No. 1 team in the polls every week this season. It’s consistently filled four of the top five spots in the rankings. And by the time postseason play rolls around, the SEC could claim half of the NCAA Regional host sites.
With that level of dominance, it’s hard to have an underwhelming weekend slate.
However, against all odds, this weekend has managed to do just that. You’re welcome, Jesus. Happy Easter.
Bet free Bama returns to Baton Rouge
Alabama travels to Baton Rouge for a showdown with LSU at Alex Box Stadium, one of just two top-15 matchups in the SEC this weekend. Across the parking lot and a few hundred yards away is a college football cathedral called Death Valley that Alabama has all but owned for the last 60 years.
That trend doesn’t apply to baseball. LSU has owned Alabama in baseball, winning 17 of the last 23 overall and eight of ten at home. Alabama’s biggest win in Baton Rouge in the last nine years was whatever amount former coach Brad Bohannon made on Fanduel two years ago when he bet against his own team in the actual dugout at The Box.
A&M is Risen! They are Risen indeed!
Please, no one tell my pastor mother I made that reference in regards to college baseball on Easter weekend. I will get smited on sight. However, no team in the SEC has resurrected themselves in the second half of the season like Texas A&M. The Aggies have won seven straight games, eight of their last nine, and won two straight conference series. They’ve also put up 112 runs in their last eight wins.
Now, they head to Fayetteville to take on another top 5 team on the road just like they did in Knoxville two weeks ago. A&M is catching the Hogs at the right time, as Arkansas is coming off a gut wrenching series loss to Georgia in Athens.
Is the Cure-iel for male loneliness watching Derek Curiel play baseball?
I really hope y’all understand that reference. Otherwise that is a really awkward headline for this segment.
Explaining jokes aside, LSU freshman Derek Curiel has been one of the most fun players to watch in America. The true freshman has reached base in all 38 games this season. He’s reached base multiple times in those games too. This LSU offense doesn’t mash or have the same power as some of the teams from the past. However, they have some exceptional, and professional level hitters up and down one through nine. That starts with Curiel in the leadoff spot.
Derek Curiel is the best freshman in college baseball. End debate. pic.twitter.com/2oS8npQt92
— SEC Unfiltered (@SECUnfiltered) April 5, 2025
Auburn and Texas meet in Austin, because of course they do
Does Texas’ entire team have a court issued ankle monitor that we don’t know about? They’ve left Austin twice in SEC play, and that was for road trips to bottom feeder Missouri and Kentucky. The teams they were scheduled to host in year one of their SEC play just so happen to be all their toughest opponents and all top ten teams. Way to go, Commissioner Sankey!