How a Fictional Soccer Coach Helped Me Rethink Masculinity, Leadership, and What It Really Means to Be a Man

When I first started watching Ted Lasso, I thought I was turning on a lighthearted soccer comedy. A quirky American football coach trying to manage a Premier League team? Sounded entertaining enough. But as the show unfolded, something surprising happened. I wasn’t just watching to laugh. I was watching to learn—about leadership, vulnerability, and what it means to be a man in a world that still tells boys/young men to toughen up and stay quiet.

Growing up as a boy in sports, I internalized a lot of rules about masculinity without realizing it. You don’t cry. You don’t talk about your feelings. You don’t ask for help. You compete, you grind, and you keep it moving. And if you’re struggling? You hide it. Because emotion is weakness, and weakness makes you less of a man.

Or at least, that’s what I believed.

But then came Ted.

Ted Lasso is a coach who leads with kindness, not control. He listens more than he talks. He shows up for his players not just as athletes, but as people. He bakes biscuits. He apologizes. He opens up about his anxiety. He cries. And somehow, he’s still respected. Not in spite of all that—but because of it.

One of the most powerful moments for me came in season two, when Ted has a panic attack and misses a game. Instead of hiding it, he talks about it with his therapist and eventually his team. There’s no dramatic music, no over-the-top confession—just honesty. And in that moment, I saw something I’d never seen in my own sports experience: a man who was strong because he was vulnerable.

That changed everything for me.

Because I’ve been in locker rooms where crying gets mocked. I’ve had coaches who demanded performance but ignored pain. I’ve had moments when I wanted to talk, but didn’t know how—because I thought being a good teammate meant being emotionless. And I’ve seen teammates, friends, and younger boys carry that same weight.

Watching Ted Lasso made me realize how dangerous those unspoken rules really are. They don’t just shape how we act on the field—they shape who we become off it. They keep boys/young men from opening up. They keep us from asking for help. They isolate us, even when we’re surrounded by people.

That’s why I started my project, Stronger Minds, Stronger Men. It’s a youth mental health initiative that uses sports as a tool to reshape the culture of masculinity. We create peer mentorship programs, publish student athlete stories, host workshops, and build spaces where boys can be honest about how they feel—without fear of being seen as weak.

Because strength doesn’t mean silence. Strength means showing up for yourself and your teammates—not just physically, but emotionally. It means leading with love, not dominance. It means doing what Ted does: being the guy who listens, who cares, and who dares to feel in a world that still tells men not to.

Ted Lasso may be fictional. But his impact on me is very real.

He reminded me of the kind of coach I want to be, the kind of teammate I want to be, and ultimately, the kind of man I want to become: someone who knows that vulnerability is not the opposite of strength—it’s the heart of it.