re: Does the SEC only get 1 National Seed this year

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Also, why should tourney champs in baseball get auto bids.

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The question is not why they get auto bids, as it is the conference that gets the auto bid and decides whether that does to the tournament winner or the regular season champ. The real question is why do conferences choose to have tournaments rather than simply let it go to the regular season champ.

In leagues where you don't play a full round robin schedule, there is a fairness aspect in not having the auto bid decided by quirks in scheduling. Would you want the SEC title decided by who gets Missouri on their schedule vs. who doesn't?

The other factor is that having the conference tournament keeps teams honest. This is less a factor in the SEC than some other leagues, but, without a conference tournament and a way to play yourself into the NCAA tournament, a lot of teams could decide in mid-season to start playing for next year, and give playing time to guys who wouldn't be in the lineup if the objective is to win now. That would result in a sort of scheduling imbalance, where the contenders who faced these teams early in the season would be at a disadvantage to teams who faced them when they were just playing out the string (like Missouri was when Arkansas swept them).