Take everyone’s favorite inside jokes, song lyrics and passive-aggressive thoughts, then broadcast them for the world to see.

Welcome to the art of subtweeting on Twitter, where the LSU football team rules over its imagined kingdom with mighty keystrokes.

The Tigers, known for their powerful hits and direct contact on the football field, often employ the site’s most ambiguous tool for personal expression.

Subtweeting involves responding to a person on Twitter without directly replying or using his or her Twitter handle. It’s roughly equivalent to the playground era, with cliquish jokes or behind-the-back snideness in equal measure.

LSU football players are just a drop in the proverbial subtweeting bucket, but several Tigers are its most visible local artists.

The examples are plentiful.

Sophomore receiver Jarvis Landry (@God_Son80) often bemoans an unrequited love, junior fullback J.C. Copeland reassures fans of his health and freshman cornerback Derrick Raymond (@DEE_RAY19) jokingly pleads with teachers to cancel class when homework piles up.

LSU players say subtweets can be liberating without stirring the pot too much.

“There’s a lot of subliminal messages in our guys’ tweets,” said sophomore punter Brad Wing (@bwing38) , one of the team’s most prolific tweeters. “It’s stuff only for us to know. It’s a way of getting things off our chests, but keeping it personal enough.”

Subtweet subjects tend to involve love interests, messages to “haters” or hip-hop lyrics that double as someone’s current mental state.

In that vein, LSU players are emotional Picassos, often firing off late-night musings, pointed commentary and inspirational messages to heartwarming and hilarious effect.

But junior linebacker Lamin Barrow, who doesn’t have a Twitter account, said subtweets’ ability to work as inside jokes also builds team camaraderie.

“The last social network I had was MySpace,” Barrow said. “I make sure to keep up with what guys are saying [on Twitter], though. The fun part about it is, if you’re not in that inner circle, you won’t know what’s going on. That kind of unity brings us together.”

Players consistently tabbed Wing — who claims he doesn’t subtweet often — senior defensive end Chancey Aghayere (@iWear_Jays_87) and sophomore defensive lineman Anthony Johnson (@Da_RealFreakLSU) as the team’s most notorious subtweeters.

While a quick scan of Aghayere’s account reveals relatively few subtweets in recent months, Wing said the 2011 defensive linemen mastered the method.

“Chancey and [junior defensive tackle] Bennie Logan (@da_king_son18) and [former tackle Michael] Brockers (@MichaelBrockers) were all over that, throwing like kidding insults and jokes at everybody,” Wing said. “They stick out as the Twitter freaks.”

Junior linebacker Kevin Minter (@Kmint_46) only recently joined Twitter.

The reason? He was tired of being lost during team discussions.

“That’s the main reason I got on [Twitter],” Minter said. “The subtweets and the stuff that went down with guys clowning each other was all I’d hear in the locker room. I had to keep up.”

The subtweets have caught the eye of LSU’s coordinator of social and new media, Jake Terry.

Terry said the players’ reputation as an emotional group requires constant monitoring, especially in the Twitter world.

“It’s a sign of the fact that they’re young and wear emotions on their sleeve,” he said. “There are occasions when I do have to tell players to take stuff down.”

One of those players was former LSU cornerback Tyrann Mathieu.

Mathieu’s rapid rise to football fame via his game-changing plays and Honey Badger persona made him a controversial subtweeter.

“Tyrann quickly eclipsed 100,000 followers and was the most followed player in college football last year,” Terry said. “He often got caught up emotionally in addressing negative followers or bait for him, which we would make him take down. We had to keep a close eye on him, but this year’s team has nobody as visible as he was.”

Minter said he sees the ignorance and negative messages in subtweets but thinks that LSU players do it “all in fun for the most part.”

That doesn’t mean he — or the rest of his LSU teammates — always understand their comrades. Minter admitted players are sometimes just as clueless as the general public about a subtweets’ meaning.

“Normally, I get my girlfriend to translate them for me,” he said. “She’s a master at reading [subtweets]. Even better than the team, but just barely.”