Southern Exposure: Getting to know the SEC

♦ University of Missouri to join Southeastern Conference (mutigers.com)

The Southeastern Conference Presidents and Chancellors, acting unanimously, announced today that the University of Missouri will join the Southeastern Conference effective July 1, 2012, with competition to begin in all sports for the 2012-13 academic year.

And so it's official:  Mizzou will be switching from the Big 12 to the SEC on July 1st 2012.

Whether you think this is a good thing, a bad thing, or a questionable thing, Mizzou to the SEC is now a true thing.

There's going to be a steep learning curve to get to know our new conference and our new rivals.  Many of us have spent years - even decades - learning all about Big 12 Baseball and the intricate details of each of our Big 12 rival schools.  

I can tell you which Big 12 coach was shorter than Tim Jamieson.  I can tell you which Big 12 star player - now major leaguer - got so mad about a Friday night at Simmons Field that he got belligerently drunk at Columbia's Holiday Inn later that night.  I can tell you how well the fans of each Big 12 team travel to games in Columbia, and how they act when they get here.  I can tell you the strike zones and odd behaviors of Big 12 umpires.

I don't know hardly anything about SEC Baseball or the SEC teams, other than the general info most people know.

Between now and the beginning of the 2013 season, our goal at SimmonsField.com is to help with the learning curve.

•  We've already begun a series titled Southern Exposure, featuring links to articles about the various SEC teams, following what they're doing, who they've signed, what the coaches are saying.  We hope to learn as we go, picking up small pieces of information along the way, fitting them into the puzzle that is SEC Baseball.
  
  
• Over the next couple of months we're going to run a series titled Dixie-nary:  The ABCs of SEC Baseball.  We hope to highlight some of the key things we need to know about life in the SEC.
  
  
• During the 2012 season, we'll shift our focus back to the Big 12, since we still have one more season to play against our historic rivals.  We'll take a look back at Mizzou's history with each of the Big 12 teams.  We'll continue the Southern Exposure link posts, but otherwise we'll focus on the season at hand.
  
  
• Beginning in July, after the change officially takes place, our plan is to work our way through two series of posts:    

• The SEC Fan's Guide to Mizzou Baseball:  They need to get to know us just as much as we need to get to know them.  

• A series of Southern Exposure posts with details about each of our new SEC rivals, including traditions, oddities, and links to websites, blogs, forums and local media

The learning curve is going to be steep, but we have 15 months before Mizzou actually begins playing in the SEC.

If any SimmonsField.com followers have information or suggestions about details to include in our SEC curriculum, drop me a line at simmonsfield@hotmail.com