Lane Kiffin finally made the call he had been hinting at for weeks: bringing out Austin Simmons after weeks in recovery and then some on the bench.
Kiffin announced last week that Simmons will finally begin seeing some action, but he only got to play in a dedicated special package and made a dual-QB play with Trinidad Chambliss against Georgia.
Their last game against Oklahoma saw Simmons getting another chance at making a comeback, first in the second quarter, which ended up in a stalled drive. Kiffin gave him another chance in the third quarter for a trick play, but the mishandling of it cost the Rebels a 10-yard penalty.
Overall, Simmons appearance was largely considered a lackluster performance.
When asked about it in his post-game conference, Kiffin explained why Simmons wasn't able to perform well.
Lane Kiffin on Simmons having a bad day against OU
"Yeah, Austin missed the pop throw. You know, there’s some schematical things, like, especially with thishead coach we were playing against (Venables) that there’s some mind games going on — not mind games, but just chess. And Austin’s got talent, and so he just missed one today where we had a schematical open touchdown," Kiffin said, pointing out that playing against a defense like Oklahoma straight off his recovery might be the challenging part for Simmons.
"And I think, too, it’s hard to prepare for. Everybody plays the other way. Everybody over time played the other way, like here’s the better thrower, necessarily, is what people would say, you know, whatever. And here’s the guy that’s more dual threat."
"And so they put in the runner, you know, like as a change-up. Well, why wouldn’t you do it the other way too? So even though we dropped one of them today, he misses one today, that’s hard, especially when they’re both in there, too, sometimes, it’s hard to game plan against, I think. Ask them (OU), I bet they would say it’s challenging."
Besides OU's defense, the pressure to match QB Trinidad Chambliss' success would be the unsaid reason.
That said, Simmons has plenty of chances left down the road as Ole Miss begins the rather easier stretch of their schedule.