Sheridan: Be patient with UA’s Petrino
Posted on Monday, August 18, 2008
Danny Sheridan’s got a bet for you.
“No team in the SEC will ever go undefeated again,” Sheridan said during a spirited 45-minute telephone interview Sunday afternoon. “I’ll give you every SEC team, every year for the rest of my life, and I’ll even give you odds.” Before you try to figure out a way to contact him, know that Sheridan just might be the best football handicapper in the country. He’s even got the waiting list to prove it.
Sheridan, perhaps most recognized for the fact he sets the daily betting lines for the USA Today, also distributes a weekly newsletter to a limited number of subscribers. Those folks also get his college and NFL picks each week of the season, usually anywhere from two to six games.
Sheridan said he limits his number of subscribers because he picks so few games, a fact most gamblers don’t like.
“Most people want to bet everything that moves,” Sheridan said.
It’s also safe to, well, bet that Sheridan’s subscription price is a handsome one. He said he began making it that way some time ago because it cut down on the hassles of trying to service the masses.
This isn’t really about Sheridan’s business so much, though, as it is about his thoughts on Arkansas ’ coming football season. When it comes to taking a look at the cold, hard facts, few have sharper vision than Sheridan.
Maybe the best example of what Sheridan calls his “objective perspective” came two years ago, Mike Shula’s last as head coach at Alabama. That’s the season in which Sheridan, a 1969 graduate of Alabama, went 9-0 picking Crimson Tide games against the spread.
“I really miss him,” Sheridan said of Shula. “I was a sick puppy when he was fired.” Sheridan, who said Shula was “completely unqualified” to be Alabama’s coach, zeroed in on the Tide in 2006 because he believed the betting public’s perception of the team was seriously skewed. While there remained a roster stocked with talented players recruited by previous coaches, Sheridan said Shula didn’t know how to utilize them.
The result, Sheridan added, was that physically inferior teams kept playing Alabama closer than they should have — often winning — while the Crimson Tide would then turn around and play its most inspired games against heavyweights like Florida and LSU.
Sheridan, meanwhile, would pick against Alabama when it was a favorite, then pick the Tide in games in which it was an underdog.
“I usually don’t pick the same team more than two or three times a year at the most,” Sheridan said, “but I knew by October what was going to happen with Alabama.” Sheridan said he got a similar feeling when Arkansas was made a double-digit underdog prior to playing at No. 1 LSU last season.
“That was one of my strongest picks of the year,” Sheridan said. “When most of my clients heard it, they moaned. But when they moan, I win about 80 to 90 percent of the time.” As for this season, Sheridan thinks a good over / under number for Arkansas is 5. 5 or 6. In other words, that’s the number he’d offer potential bettors, forcing them to choose whether the Razorbacks will win more or less games.
Like a lot of people, Sheridan bases much of his assessment on Arkansas’ brutal schedule.
“This conference is murder,” Sheridan said.
The widespread talent in the SEC, combined with Sheridan’s belief that a team will play at its maximum level just three or four times a season, is mainly what led him to pick a relatively low over / under number for the Hogs. But that number, he said, should go higher in coming seasons as Coach Bobby Petrino establishes his own way doing things.
“If he were to win five or six games this year, I think that would be outstanding,” Sheridan said. “If he were to win seven games, I’d probably vote him coach of the year in the conference.” For now, Sheridan hopes Arkansas’ fans, boosters and bosses remain patient with Petrino in what could be a challenging season. As has been proven at Alabama and other places, Sheridan said, meddling with coaches can be disastrous.
“If they leave Petrino alone and let him build it his way,” Sheridan said, “I think he’ll have them in the hunt in three years.” Now that sounds like a gamble Arkansas fans should be willing to take.
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