No winner yet in Seahawks’ QB competition

By Liz Mathews

The Seahawks wrapped up minicamp on Thursday with no clear winner in the quarterback competition. Head coach Pete Carroll said it might come down to the preseason games.

“At this point they’re doing everything they can do with the opportunities and they look good, so I can’t tell you that there’s anything that’s happened other than we’ll stay with the same format going into [training] camp — I don’t think that will change,” Carroll said. “T-Jack [Tarvaris Jackson] will go first and away we go.

“But other than that, let the games begin.”

Throughout minicamp and similar to the offseason workouts, Jackson, Matt Flynn and Russell Wilson had been splitting the practice reps evenly, each carrying the workload one day with the first-team offense.

“It’s worked out OK,” Carroll said of the three-man rotation. “I won’t make a statement about that yet, but it’s worked out OK to give them an even shot. That’s the point, is to really make it as evenly competitive as they possibly can.”

Carroll did say that Jackson has an advantage over Flynn and Wilson having worked so long in offensive coordinator Darrell Bevell’s system.

“It’s great competition, it’s a healthy competition,” Jackson said after taking most of the reps on Tuesday. “Pretty much all the guys get along in there. So however we get put in, we’ve just got to take advantage of every rep we get.

“So we just take the reps whenever we get them and just try to make the best of them.”

Flynn got his chance on Wednesday and told the media after practice that he is more than familiar with these types of competitions. Flynn backed up starter Aaron Rodgers for four years in Green Bay.

“There’s a lot of traps you can fall into when you do a competition for anybody at any position,” Flynn said. “So I’ve been there and I know that the first thing you learn is you can’t control what they do. You can only control what you do.”

As for rookie Wilson, he stepped in with the starters on Thursday. Wilson said he wasn’t surprised when Carroll opened it up to a three-man competition.

“I’m the type of person that competes no matter what somebody says or doesn’t say — that’s just the way I am,” Wilson said. “That’s the way I’ve been raised and I think it’s one of the reasons why I’m here today. Focus on what you can control. Focus on being effective and being very, very efficient with the football and putting your best foot forward every single time and just having a winning performance.”

And for the first time in over a month, backup quarterback Josh Portis was part of the action on the practice field.

“I was ready for my opportunity,” Portis said on Thursday. “They just put me in there and I tried to make some plays and I was having fun.”

With three quarterbacks already splitting the practice reps, Portis has spent the majority of the offseason on the sideline.

“It’s tough, but it’s life,” Portis said. “I just try to do the best that I can and work hard at my craft every day. I was looking forward to it, the offseason and unfortunately, things didn’t happen.

“I’ve just got to roll with the punches and keep being positive because at the end of the day, it’s not about me, it’s about the team.”