Jason Sudeikis Based Ted Lasso On Three Real-Life Coaches

Given his origin as an American football coach in London, it should come as no surprise that three coaches outside the world of soccer (or Premier League football) inspired Ted Lasso. In his early appearances as Ted, first on the NBC Sports Network and then in his own Apple TV+ series, Jason Sudeikis milked humor out of the character's nature as a guy who was clueless about that other form of "football" and unqualified to coach it, since all his experience came from a stateside game with different rules.

In "Ted Lasso" season 3, we've also seen Ted draw inspiration from basketball, specifically, the triangle offense made famous by the Chicago Bulls (which, unbeknownst to him, already had a Premier League equivalent in the "Total Football" strategy). Sudeikis is no stranger to Chicago, having lived and performed improv comedy there early in his career. Small wonder, then, that it's a Chicago football coach and two basketball coaches who inspired Ted Lasso.

In a recent appearance on the YouTube talk show Hot Ones, Sudeikis discussed the character's beginnings, saying:

"[Ted Lasso] is an amalgamation of a bunch of different, you know, teachers, mentors, you know, whether people I actually got to meet or work alongside of or be coached by. But then, you know, certain elements of it — the look was kind of inspired by Mike Ditka, you know, having the shades and the short polyester shorts and the mustache was very much Ditka."

As the coach of the Chicago Bears (a.k.a. Da Bears), Mike Ditka and his look are famous enough to have inspired a recurring "Saturday Night Live" sketch, years before Sudeikis joined the cast. Compare Ted and his mustache with "Bill Swerski's Superfans," and it's easy to see Ditka's influence on the character. 

Jason Sudeikis revealed a personal connection to the first of the two real-life basketball coaches who also inspired Ted Lasso:

"I had my high school basketball coach, a fella named Donnie Campbell, you know, would do those little turns of phrases like Ted does. And, you know, I always loved those things, and he also was the one that really pretty much introduced myself and my teammates to John Wooden, who was the UCLA basketball coach that has a bunch of phrases that are more, like, philosophical than, you know, pop culture or quirky and whatnot."

John Wooden was so famous for his motivational quotes that they became known as Woodenisms. Hearing pearls of Woodenist wisdom like, "The best competition I have is against myself to become better," and, "Things turn out best for the people who make the best of the way things turn out," it's easy to see his influence on the character of Ted Lasso.

It wasn't only football and basketball coaches, though, who inspired Ted Lasso in his current form. In a separate interview with The Guardian this month, Sudeikis said that after he saw "Donald Trump coming down the escalator," giving rise to Trumpism in America, he decided to make Ted less "belligerent" on Apple TV+ than he was in his earliest NBC Sports skits. "Ted Lasso" has been promoted with phrases like, "Kindness is making a comeback," and with his show premiering while the 45th U.S. president was still in office, maybe part of his popularity in season 1 stemmed from him being the anti-Trump, giving viewers a warm and kind escape from the horrors of 2020.

"Ted Lasso" in its complete form can be streamed on Apple TV+.