Browns quarterback Brandon Weeden recently said he wants to be the guy. And then the Browns went out and signed another guy.
Weeden admits that the move to add Brian Hoyer, cut last week by the Cardinals, was unexpected.
“I was surprised, but that’s the nature of the beast,” Weeden said Friday, per Mary Kay Cabot of the Cleveland Plain Dealer. “It’s part of this business and if you start worrying about it, that’s too much to worry about. That’s my mentality going forward.”
Weeden said he hasn’t been told what the Browns plan for Hoyer. “I have no idea,” Weeden said. “I’m worried about me.”
Per Cabot, Hoyer arrives as No. 3 on the depth chart, behind Weeden and Jason Campbell. Hoyer then will have the opportunity to climb the ladder.
Weeden thinks he’ll hold off all comers. “You can’t play this position timid or [not] confident,” Weeden said. “You’ve got to be confident all the time. Once I got my head in this playbook and realized how good this system is and how good it fits the guys we have in place, it kind of made me excited and lit a fire under everybody to really want to take that next step including myself.”
Campbell, the first quarterback acquired by the new regime in Cleveland, wasn’t surprised by the new arrival. “You usually go into training camp with four quarterbacks,” Campbell said. “You knew somewhere along that it would probably happen.”
The fact that it happened with Hoyer should give both Weeden and Campbell concern. During his tenure with NFL Network, Browns G.M. Mike Lombardi heaped praise on Hoyer. “I’ve said this many times: If I would have taken the GM job of the 49ers, I would have gone after Brian Hoyer, because I think he has all the traits and characteristics,” Lombardi said in December 2011, via Cabot. “If I were the Cleveland Browns, I’d rather have Brian Hoyer behind center than Colt McCoy.”
Hoyer now has a dramatically better chance of being under center for the Browns than McCoy. Whether Hoyer gets there ahead of Weeden and Campbell is to be determined.
If it happens, it would be an amazing development, given that Hoyer was out of the league for most of the 2012 season.