The prognosticators don’t believe in the Tigers, Pawl!!!
SEC Media Days have come and gone which means the media’s ever important preseason predictions are being unveiled and THEY (you know who they are) are kinda high on LSU, but not super high.
Brian Kelly and his Tigers were projected to finish 4th in the SEC race this season, while Texas was predicted to win the league. The full 16-team projections are as follows:
- Texas
- Georgia
- Alabama
- LSU
- South Carolina
- Florida
- Ole Miss
- Texas A&M
- Tennessee
- Oklahoma
- Auburn
- Missouri
- Vanderbilt
- Arkansas
- Kentucky
- Mississippi State
I think this is right? I’d quibble a little bit with Alabama being projected ahead of LSU, but I also recognize LSU got thumped by the Tide in Baton Rouge last fall and will have to make the trip to Tuscaloosa in November.
These preseason predictions are just that: predictions. They have no bearing whatsoever on this upcoming season, but I don’t think anyone around these parts would be happy with a fourth-place finish in the SEC, especially with how much LSU’s invested in this year’s roster. But I suppose as long as LSU gets in the 12-team playoff, and they’re the last team standing (a la Ohio State last season) that’s the real prize.
The media also announced its preseason teams and LSU has seven players littered across the first, second, and third teams. The Tigers only have one First-Team selection, and it is not quarterback Garrett Nussmeier, that distinction belongs to South Carolina’s LaNorris Sellers. Instead, LSU’s lone First-Team selection is linebacker Whit Weeks. Nussmeier, on the other hand, lands on the Second-Team. But again it’s not how you start, it’s how you finish.
LSU’s preseason All-SEC members are:
- Whit Weeks (First-Team LB)
- Garrett Nussmeier (Second-Team QB)
- Caden Durham (Second-Team RB)
- Aaron Anderson (Second-Team WR)
- Harold Perkins (Second-Team LB)
- Barion Brown (Second-Team Return Specialist)
- Zavion Thomas (Second-Team All-Purpose, Third-Team Return Specialist)