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Ole Miss baseball SEC West favorites in 2021 SEC coaches preseason poll

The boys are (very soon) back in town.

By John Macon Gillespie
Ole Miss Athletics

The 2021 SEC baseball preseason coaches poll was released on Thursday, and we would be absolutely fine with things panning out the way the ball coaches are predicting. Ole Miss was projected to finish atop the SEC West in 2021 and earned seven of the 14 first place votes. The other seven were parceled out between Mississippi State, Arkansas and LSU.

In the East, Florida ran away with the top prediction, garnering 13 of the first place votes. The other vote went to Vanderbilt.

Overall, here’s how the coaches’ poll shaped up. (Parenthesis indicates No. of first place votes).

SEC East

  1. Florida (13)
  2. Vanderbilt (1)
  3. Tennessee
  4. South Carolina
  5. Georgia
  6. Missouri
  7. Kentucky

SEC West

  1. Ole Miss (7)
  2. Mississippi State (3)
  3. Arkansas (2)
  4. LSU (2)
  5. Texas A&M
  6. Auburn
  7. Alabama

As you can see here, the skippers in the SEC are much less sold on who will take home the western division crown in 2021, but Ole Miss got the majority nod, and for that, we pray and hope it comes to fruition.

Ole Miss’ baseball Twitter account hopes so, too.

If you’ll notice, only two Rebels were selected as Preseason All-SEC members: Tim Elko and Hayden Dunhurst. In a subject that was discussed vehemently in the Slack channel while I was in class (no, I wasn’t checking my phone during class. Why do you ask?), on paper, this is a complete ball club, and, like we have said many times before, has the potential to be really, really special. The phrase “Omaha or bust” was even uttered. Surely that won’t come back to bring immense pain and misery that is only accompanied by failing to meet lofty expectations set forth by the die-hard fan. Surely not.

Anyway, people are high on the Rebs this season, which, again, is equally exciting and terrifying, iyam. Ole Miss is a consensus top-10 team across the various polls, breaking the top-five in certain listings. The pitching depth is there, and the lineup should be able to produce pretty well, too, despite not having a ton of experience facing SEC pitching across the board.

All-in-all, even though the basketball has been more fun as of late, bring on baseball season. It’s a sign that nature is healing, and we could all use a little spike in our blood pressure.