While it’s snuck up on Vandy fans, that time is really here: SEC baseball is upon us. Vanderbilt travels to the Plains to take on the #25 Auburn Tigers in their first SEC series.

Vanderbilt and Auburn are both 14-3, ranked, and appear to be even matchups on paper. Both teams have similar quality starting pitching, and while the offenses have very different strategies, they have had relatively similar production.

Auburn has not had to play many high quality opponents, but those who they have faced they have beaten. Auburn has wins over then #8 Oregon State, #24 Troy, and a 13-3 Baylor team. On the other hand, they have losses to Old Dominion, UAB, and Holy Cross – so there is some variability in their performance.

Vanderbilt, in a stark departure from years past, has no injuries to any player that has made an appearance thus far. Jacob Humphrey was reported as “sore” by Tim Corbin, but he will not be limited for this series.

Auburn is missing one big bat due to injury. All SEC catcher and projected first round pick Ike Irish is out for the Tigers. Irish has struggled this season, to a degree, batting only .278 with 1 home run and 13 RBIs, but it’s still a proven and high potential bat out for the Tigers. True freshman Chase Fralick, who has been splitting time between DH and C, will be behind the plate for Auburn. Fralick is batting .400 with 1 home run and 15 RBIs on the season.

Auburn has 5 elite offensive players and then a very average lineup behind them. They are led by Cooper McMurray who is batting .415 with 6 home runs, 6 doubles, and 22 RBIs this season. The fifth year senior has taken a massive jump and has been terrorizing pitching all over the country. Behind him, Auburn has four batters over .300 (2 of whom are batting .400 or better). Junior USF transfer Eric Snow has taken a massive step, batting .403 with 3 home runs and 5 doubles, the aforementioned Fralick is the other player batting .400 or above. Senior Florida transfer Deric Fabian as well as former All-SEC All Freshman Team Member and Texas transfer Cade Belyeu are both hitting above .300 and have combined to go 17-19 on stolen bases this season.

Those five have combined for 64% of Auburn’s hits, 62% of their RBIs, and 64% of their home runs. While the rest of Auburn’s offense is by no means incompetent, limiting those top 5 bats will be key to Vanderbilt’s success.

Arguably the biggest weakness in Auburn’s team last year, the Tigers have revamped their pitching staff through the portal and high school recruiting. No starter for Auburn played for them last season.

On Friday Vanderbilt will face Samuel Dutton, who currently sits at 2-1 with a 1.31 ERA. Dutton might be the biggest surprise on the Tigers’ roster, as he played for 3 years at LSU and was merely an OK arm out of the bullpen. Since transferring to Auburn he has only allowed 4 runs in over 20 innings and has now been promoted to the Friday night arm. Vanderbilt will, however, be by far the best team he has faced (the best team Dutton has faced is a 5-9 Ohio State team).

Saturday will feature Cade Fisher on the bump for Auburn. Fisher had one of the best freshman seasons in the country for Florida in 2023 before struggling as a starter in ‘24 and eventually transferring to Auburn. Fisher has struggled so far, as he has not gone more than 3.1 innings in a start and has posted a mediocre 5.14 ERA. Fisher’s biggest struggle has been allowing free bases, as he is walking a batter per inning and has consistently worked himself into jams. All this being said, the stuff for Fisher is nasty and if he can put things together he has the potential to be one of the best pitchers in the country. It remains to be seen what version of Fisher will show up on Saturday night.

On Sunday true freshman Christian Chatterton will face his biggest challenge of his young career thus far. The former Perfect Game All-American was the gem of Auburn’s recruiting class and has lived up to the billing so far. He has a 2.66 ERA through 20.1 IP and has a WHIP of 1.04. While, again, he has not faced much high level competition as a starter, he has great stuff and has performed well in his limited time. Vanderbilt will want to get to Chatterton early and not let him settle down in his first SEC start.

Behind those three Auburn has a few quality bullpen arms. Sophomores Alex Petrovic and Cam Tilly have been the first arms out the pen and have ERAs of 2.25 and 3.55, respectively (they both have WHIPs under 1, too). Alongside those two, senior Parker Carlson and freshman Jackson Sanders have also been solid, posting ERAs below 4 with over 10 innings of work. The sentiment amongst Auburn fans has been that the bullpen is much improved and a strength of the team due to these four. After them, though, the performance does drop off significantly. If Vanderbilt can get into Auburn’s bullpen early, they will likely have success against Auburn’s weaker arms.

On paper these two teams are about as evenly matched as possible. Seriously, take a look at this. Both have a strong top of the order with questions about supporting pieces, two very good starters and another high potential arm trying to piece things together, and a very good top of the bullpen followed by unproven arms. It’s truly a coin flip as to whose roster is the superior one.

For that reason I will predict that the home team will come out victorious. It’s no secret that Vanderbilt has struggled mightily on the road over the last few seasons, and with rosters this evenly matched I’ll take Auburn to win the series 2-1.

Note: Playing at Auburn is significant for another reason, too. Auburn’s park is one of the most hitter friendly in the SEC and will be the FIRST hitter-friendly park that Vanderbilt has played in. It’s now time for all the talk about the lack of power production being, in part, due to pitcher friendly parks to be proven right or wrong.