For the love of football, stop. PLEASE! Listening to people plead the case for Tarvaris Jackson or Charlie Whitehurst, and even Josh Portis, is just embarrassing and pointless for all involved. Neither Jackson or Whitehurst have any meaningful future with this franchise. They are both battling for the right to mentor and then back-up the QB of the Future (QBOTF) who the team will draft next season. They are both almost hopelessly mediocre players. Almost, because you can never count anyone out, and both show some modest promise to be serviceable starters.
If the front office had any hope for either player, their contracts would reflect it. Whitehurst is in his final year. Jackson is signed through next year, and even that is not guaranteed. There is no evidence that the team is planning for either of these players to be leading this team when it is ready to challenge for a Super Bowl.
Start Whitehurst. Start Jackson. It just doesn’t matter. At most, we are talking about a difference of perhaps 1 game plus/minus in the win column. If you want to debate which guy gives you that possible 1-game advantage in a clearly limited season, go ahead. You will be missing the things that actually matter about this season, like the development of the offensive line, the wide receivers, the tight ends, the linebackers and the secondary. The quarterback situation matters less than perhaps any other position on the entire roster. Heck, punter Jon Ryan has a better chance of starting for Super Bowl-contending Seahawks team than either Whitehurst or Jackson.
I will continue to evaluate the players across the team, including the quarterbacks, but I’m certainly not going to lose any sleep over who wins the right to play below league average at the position.
ADDENDUM: I forgot to add that asking for Whitehurst to get more reps is batshit crazy. Whoever starts at QB for this team will barely get enough snaps this pre-season given the lockout. Splitting reps would lose the team more games than any possible advantage they would gain by figuring out which of these mediocre quarterbacks is “better.” Pete Carroll is doing the absolute right thing by choosing one guy and sticking with him.