The Ted Lasso Relationship Guide: Protect Nate, Protect the Team
Breaking down S3E4, Big One
First match against West Ham! Rupert continues to be horrible! Ted is a “word in progmess!” We get one of the best Trent Crimm jokes ever! Keely meets her boss! Nate is going to give us that redemption arc (maybe!)!
As the man (and title) says, this was a “Big One.” Season 3 is hitting us with so much and it’s developing so much more richness in what is already a pretty exceptional show. I love that we are finding so much more in each of the characters. I love really getting to know characters, and I feel like the writers are giving us so much to know about the folks we’ve come to love over the past few years.
Today I want to write about the decision of Coach Beard and Roy to go ahead and show the team the recording of Nate tearing up the “believe” sign during the West Ham game. It goes to what I wrote about a few weeks ago with regard to Nate’s coaching style, but taken to an extreme.
When Isaac goes to tap the “believe” sign over Ted’s office door, the whole thing falls apart, leaving the team to realize that it had been torn by someone. Later, Beard and Roy show Ted a video of Nate’s actual destruction of the sign. They suggest that it might be a good way to motivate the team in the upcoming match against West Ham, and they also suggest that Ted needs to address his hurt from the confrontation with Nate. Ted pushes aside both suggestions.
At the midway point of the match with West Ham, Richmond is down by 2. Rebecca needs to speak with Ted, so he tells Beard and Roy to surprise him with a strategy for the second half, at which point the assistant coaches show the team the recording, making them absolutely livid. But in their anger, the team becomes sloppy, receiving numerous red cards and losing the game by a more significant margin than they should have.
This was a fascinating part of the episode for a couple of reasons. First, I believe this is the only time we’ve seen Coach Beard go over Ted’s head. Even when he clearly doesn’t agree with Ted’s coaching tactics, he won’t undermine them. He knows his role as an assistant coach and he doesn’t fight that. It doesn’t mean that he doesn’t let Ted know what he thinks, but he doesn’t undercut the decisions that Ted makes. His discomfort with the loss is palpable. Even though as the head coach, Ted is ultimately responsible for the outcome, Beard knows that he is to blame for the way the team played.
I also think it shows the difference in the desires of Beard and Ted. From the beginning, Ted has said that how the team plays and who the team becomes is of greater importance to him than winning. And honestly, it shows in the outcomes. While we have seen a lot of growth in the players individually, they have been a middling team when Ted is at the helm. They got better in season 2 when Roy let Jamie be less nice than he was under Ted. And they have been better this season because of Zava, not as much because of Ted’s coaching, which had them predicted to be in last place.
Ted’s brand of coaching is great for the people he’s coaching, but his lack of enthusiasm for winning means that he makes choices that might not push the team to excellence. We’re clearly seeing that mindset affecting Ted, as he is being pushed to win by Rebecca and by his coaching staff. I think that is going to play into his decision to ultimately head back to the states (that’s me guessing - I have no inside track on this!).
Ted choosing not to show the video originally seemed like he was just protecting Nate from being picked on yet again. But as we discover when the team sees it, it turns them into people who are hateful not just toward Nate, but to anything associated with him. Their hate for one person clouds their ability to make any kind of healthy decisions. Ted is protecting both Nate and the team by not showing the video.
One of the things that this show has been lauded for since people discovered it is the commitment to kindness on display throughout its run. I know it is what drew me to it. I tend toward cynicism, and when it came out in 2020, my distrust of most people and institutions was pretty high. Watching this show always reminds me that generally speaking, people are more kind than I give them credit for.
What I love about this show that we saw in season 2 and seem to be seeing even more here in season 3, is that it is not kindness to ignore wrongdoing or even simply negative feelings. Ted is right that stirring anger and contempt is a path that won’t lead anywhere productive, but the unresolved situation with Nate also shows him that ignoring pain also has negative outcomes. We see that in his conversation with Michelle, when he confesses some of his concerns about her new dating situation. I am hopeful that we will see him make a similar move toward Nate to help repair that relationship.
I appreciate that this show is making a distinction between being nice or polite and being kind. It can be easy to confuse the two, but while one is just about choosing the path of least resistance, kindness is about showing genuine care to the people in your life, which sometimes means being honest about hard things.
In my first marriage, my ex and I were nice to each other. We got along fine, but we never really talked about hard things. That might lead to a fight and we weren’t supposed to fight. So instead, resentments were buried to keep the peace. That we’re not together anymore shows how well that worked out.
In my current marriage, we both try to be kind, meaning we strive to be honest with one another while also continuing to consider one another’s feelings. Sometimes it’s not a good time to dive into hurt feelings because we recognize we might say something wounding, but rather than ignoring it altogether, we wait until we are in a better headspace. When we need to discuss painful feelings, we try to assume good intentions from what is being said. Where nice was a relationship killer, kindness has been a relationship healer.
I think we’re going to see that same thing in the coming weeks in Ted Lasso.
How have you experienced the difference between niceness and kindness? What does kindness look like in your relationships?