Lane Kiffin explains decision to have safeties play rock-paper-scissors to determine who starts

It was revealed during the pre-game of Ole Miss‘ recent matchup against Vanderbilt by defensive coordinator Chris Partridge that the Rebels have an interesting method of determining who will be their starting two safeties week in and week out. Every week safeties Tysheem Johnson, Isheem Young, and Ladarius Tennison all play a friendly game of rock-paper-scissors to determine who will start, which head coach Lane Kiffin spoke about following their 52-28 win over the Commodores.

“That’s why we don’t let assistant coaches talk to the media because Partridge decided to tell the media that we do that,” Kiffin joked.

Having too much talent is definitely a problem that every coach in the country would love to have, but it sounds like it’s more of a requirement due to the Rebels’ style of play.

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“That’s just something that we were in a situation with three really good players that basically played two spots and we play a lot of plays on defense because of our offensive tempo,” Kiffin explained. “So it’s very hard for anybody to play the whole game and play really fast.”

Kiffin’s solution to the problem? Playing the world’s oldest hand game, which may sound like a fun solution, but seems to be one that’s in the best interest of the Ole Miss coaching staff more than the players.

“So we knew we’d end up playing, whatever if there’s 80 plays and 60 between all of them, so I just said you can’t hold it against us which one starts, so let them play rock-paper-scissors every week, they can only blame themselves,” Kiffin explained. “It’s a classic, then they argue because one wins and of course, they best two out of three, so it gets them arguing with each other, not us.”

The Rebels’ trio of safeties may get competitive in their rock-paper-scissors games, but have been competitive on the field too, combining for 82 tackles as a trio. And however you feel about their method, the results are hard to deny, as Ole Miss remains unbeaten through six weeks and ranks No. 9 in the country.

Ole Miss safeties used rock-paper-scissors to decide who will start vs Vanderbilt

In the transfer portal and NIL era of college football, it’s clear that college football coaches across the country have had to give up plenty of power and control over their roster. Ole Miss head coach Lane Kiffin has never been afraid to do things differently and he recently allowed his defensive coordinator Chris Partridge to take player empowerment to the next level. On Saturday, SEC Network sideline reporter Alyssa Lang revealed that Partridge allows his safeties to play rock, paper, scissors in order to decide who starts each game every Saturday. Check out this nugget of information that Lang shared on the Vanderbilt-Ole Miss broadcast Saturday afternoon.

You can listen to the audio below, but there is also a transcribed version of the audio right below the video clip that Lang posted to Twitter.

What do you do when you have *3* stud safeties?

Play Rock Paper Scissors to decide who starts, of course 😂@OleMissFB

cc: @TakeoSpikes51 👀 pic.twitter.com/l7NVeYQwFi

— Alyssa Lang (@AlyssaLang) October 9, 2022

“Yeah, guys you talked about how dominant this unit has been for Ole Miss. So far this season, coaches credit the unselfishness of that side of the ball for why they’ve been so successful. In fact, defensive coordinator Chris Partridge told us this week that Tysheem Johnson, Isheem Young, and Ladarius Tennison actually played rock, paper, scissors every single Saturday to figure out who’s going to go out there and start the football game. Head coach Lane Kiffin said, ‘Well, yeah, you have these great safeties. We play so fast on offense, it doesn’t really matter who starts because every single one of those guys is gonna get a ton of plays. So, you have three guys who start in two spots. Well, that’s what you need if you’re going to go 80 plays.’

“So instead of coach, how about you choose and maybe ruffling some feathers, they have the guys do it. But, hey, they’re so unselfish. We’ll see though. In a few minutes who won today’s version of rock, paper, scissors when this defense trots out there,” Lang said on the SEC Network broadcast.

On3’s Wade Peery contributed to this report