Signal processing delays are selected from a candidate set in a wireless receiver based on both present and past channel behavior. According to one embodiment, a subset of signal processing delays are selected for received signal processing by accumulating a history of periodic delay selection computations for a candidate set of signal processing delays during a time interval. The delay selection calculations are based on cross-correlations between different ones of the signal processing delays. At the end of the time interval, a subset of the signal processing delays are selected from the candidate set of delays for received signal processing based on the history of delay selection computations.