Backpedaling Seneca

So Seneca Wallace wants to mentor new Browns quarterback Brandon Weeden. How charitable of him.

Could it be that the club’s diminutive backup quarterback looks at the depth chart and sees his name planted firmly behind that of Weeden and Colt McCoy? Yep, the same McCoy Wallace declined to mentor last season.

“I know my job going into my 10^th season of being in this (west coast) offense is to prepare Brandon Weeden to get him right and make sure he’s ready for day one,” Wallace told a local Cleveland sports talk station recently.

“This is a different beast. This is a first-rounder we drafted . . . and from a business standpoint, you know and everybody else knows and outsiders know this kid’s got to play. My job as a veteran guy is to make sure he’s ready.”

A neat 180 from a year ago when Wallace declared he’s “not a mentor” to McCoy even though it was obvious who the was going to start the season under center. Coming off a decent rookie season, McCoy was definitely the man.

Wallace didn’t see it that way. “Last year going into the season, there was an open competition with me and Colt McCoy,” he told the radio station. “I said if Colt was to ask me about anything I had related to the west coast system, I was willing to do that for him.”

In trying to earn the starting job, he said, “I couldn’t give him all my tips. I didn’t want to give them all away, but if he asked, I was willing to help.”

So we have to assume that because he’s more than willing to impart his vast knowledge of the west coast system to Weeden, he’s basically conceding he won’t be in the competition for the starting job this season.

In fact, his recalcitrant ways in his behavior toward McCoy could lead to the Browns cashiering him before training camp. Why do they need him when new offensive coordinator Brad Childress can introduce Weeden to the west coast?

Could it be that Wallace is trying to get on the front office’s good side because he sees his future in Cleveland in jeopardy? His backpedaling from last season’s stance is almost predictable.

Wallace is not a dummy. He knows what’s coming and is desperately clinging to his job. He knows this might be his last stop before retirement and wants to hang on as long as possible.

The only reason he was brought to the Browns by Mike Holmgren was to mentor McCoy’s conversion from the spread offense he ran his entire football career. It was not Jake Delhomme’s job to do that. It was Wallace’s.

He mistook last season’s open competition for the starting job because Holmgren and coach Pat Shurmur wanted to push McCoy. It was never really open.

Holmgren and Shurmur are doing to same thing this season by declaring the starting quarterback job is once again wide open. No it’s not. Unless he gets hurt, Weeden will be the opening-game quarterback for the Browns. By then, it’s very likely McCoy will be his backup.

The only way Wallace sticks with the club is if Tom Heckert Jr. can find a buyer for McCoy. There’s still plenty of time between now and training camp in late July. But if McCoy is still on the roster by then, Seneca Wallace is history in Cleveland.

No big loss.