I’ve been thinking a lot about a Rockpile Joelle Milholm wrote last season, “The Rockies need Ted Lasso.”
At the beginning of another Bud Black-led season, Joelle called for the Rockies to embrace confidence and joy, even in the face of what would turn out to be a 101-loss season.
Fast forward to September 2025, and I believe the Rockies have found him in interim manager Warren Schaeffer.
Even if you haven’t seen Ted Lasso, you’ve likely seen his iconic “Believe” sign.
The gist of the show is this: An
American football coach from Kansas, after some success with the Wichita State University Shockers, is tasked with managing the Premier League club AFC Richmond in England. While Ted has never played nor coached soccer, he at least knows how to lead a team. And his relentless positivity radiates through every facet of the team, getting even the most jaded of folks to buy into “The Lasso Way.”
The team has its ups and downs over the course of three seasons — including relegation at the end of Season 1, promotion back into the Premier League at the end of Season 2, and barely finishing second in the league at the end of Season 3 (plus another promotion).
But through it all, Ted’s message stays the same: Believe.
Unlike Ted Lasso, Warren Schaeffer has played the sport he’s coaching. He spent six seasons in the Rockies’ minor-league system before retiring and turning to coaching full-time. Like many players, Schaeffer started with the Low-A Asheville Tourists and worked his way up, eventually making his MLB (managerial) debut on May 12, 2025.
And while he never made his own MLB debut as a player, Schaeffer has done a stellar job of leading this team and changing their way of thinking. Let’s call it “The Schaeffer Way.”
His message? “Play free.”
And what does “play free” mean? It means being patient and trusting the players and the process.
“These are young players where, if they make mental mistakes — which you expect that they’re going to — there has to be a level of patience,” Schaeffer said in early August. “You have to trust and give them the directive that, ‘this is what you’ve done wrong. I don’t want you to go out there and play tight and feel like you can’t make another mistake. I want you to know what you did wrong, fix it, move forward, and play free and don’t worry about me.’”
As Schaeffer put it, “Nothing works when you’re tight. So (I just want them) playing free and believing in each other.”
There’s that word again: Believe.
Schaeffer’s role in allowing players to play free is being consistent and supportive.
“I pump belief into them because it’s natural. I do believe in them, and I just try to be positive all the time,” Schaeffer said earlier this month.
There’s that word again: Believe.
And there are numerous other “Lasso-isms” that come to mind with Warren Schaeffer. Even if he admittedly has not seen the show himself, there are some uncanny parallels between the two. Here are some “Schaeffer-isms” that stuck out to me, and their Ted Lasso counterparts:
- Ted Lasso: “Be a goldfish”
Warren Schaeffer (May 27): “We could take this moment that we’re in right now and look back three years from now and say, ‘Boy, we used that the right way to move forward.’ But if we’re going to commiserate and wallow in our pit, that’s no way for a man to act, and that’s no way for a group of players and just a group of people to act if you want to move forward.”
Warren Schaeffer (August 18); “When you’re in the mire of what we’re in this year, in terms of losing more games than we would like, there’s a tendency to analyze everything that is wrong with yourself. But when you commit every day to each other – getting somebody better today. Even if you’re on the IL, you try to get somebody else better today and help somebody along somehow. It has to be a daily commitment, which is what I’ve done and I think a lot of the guys have done as well. I think that’s the start of a really good culture.”
- Ted Lasso: “Be curious, not judgmental.”
Warren Schaeffer (August 18): “I’m just genuinely concerned about who [Nick Anderson] is, and I want to get to know him because I feel like with the more you get to know people on your team – the more you get to know your players – the more you can understand them and the more you can put them in the best position that they can be in to succeed. It’s all about them.”
Warren Schaeffer (August 18): “To see a group of guys unifying together to build on something for the future, that’s what’s important to us. What are we committing to? What is important to us as a group? Can young guys do it quickly, at least enough to build on something for the future? Seeing guys come together with a common cause of playing the game a different way that can beat teams all across the league, especially in the West because it takes a unified approach to be able to do that.”
- Ted Lasso: “Every choice is a chance.”
Warren Schaeffer (September 14): “On a daily basis, you have to become intentional, in my experience, especially this year because it’s the hardest time. You have to be intentional about what you put into your mind, and you have to be intentional on how you think. Otherwise, there’s too much nonsense that can get in your brain, so these actions that you take in the morning to start the day is it. It’s for the benefits of having a clear mind – not for me, but for the benefit of the player – so I can give them all I need to give them in this position.”
- Ted Lasso: “Smells like potential.”
Warren Schaeffer (September 14): “I’m just looking forward to watching these guys develop more and finish strong. That’s all, I think, And I’m just excited to watch them play every day and to surprise teams. You know, we play two non-playoff teams at home, and then two playoff teams on the road, because the Giants are fighting. So we have a chance to make it hard on those teams moving forward, so there’s no reason not to, for sure”
There are plenty of other parallel quotes, but these are the ones that stood out.
The parallels between Coach Schaeffer and Coach Lasso are clear. They are both optimistic, yet realistic, about what they expect from themselves and their players. They understand that culture building is the foundation to any successful workplace, and then the fundamentals and technical skills will sprout from that cultural foundation.
And the players are taking notice.
“I think Schaeff’s leadership style is one of the best I’ve been around,” Mickey Moniak said on Sunday after a 9-6 loss to the Padres. “I think that he genuinely cares about each and every guy in this clubhouse. He wants to win. He wants to put us in the best situation to win. It’s been a tough year, just all together, and I think just his steadfastness throughout this whole season, ever since he took over — and even before that when he was a coach — I think just speaks volumes to the kind of person he is and type of leader he is.”
Moniak echoed that on Tuesday after a 6-5 loss where the Rockies scored all five of their runs in the eighth and ninth innings.
“We’ve been in a lot of these games, we’ve battled back from big deficits late in games,” he said. “We’ve come out with wins in some of them, we’ve come up short just like tonight in a lot of them. I think that’s the confidence Schaeffer instills in us and the belief that we have. But it starts at the top.”
There’s that word again: Belief.
Braxton Fulford specifically cited “playing free” as something that helped him through his debut year.
“I think mentally, just allowing myself to be aggressive, allowing myself to play free,” he said. “I’m not worrying about mistakes or trying to be too perfect, not being afraid to fail, just going out there and playing hard regardless what happens.”
Antonio Senzatela has been with the Rockies since 2017, and even he’s noticing a difference in the clubhouse under Schaeffer’s leadership.
“I think that he give more more freedom to the young guys,” Senzatela said. “It’s good for them, they can start playing the ballgame. Like, ‘play free.’ That’s a little different, but the rest is the same [from Bud Black’s tenure].”
Whether or not Schaeffer gets the permanent job in 2026 is still anyone’s guess, but you can’t say he hasn’t made the most of his opportunity. Just like “Believe” before it, “Play Free” radiates through the clubhouse. The players believe in him, and they have been playing better and more inspired under his leadership. They are often down, but they are never out anymore.
I believe in Warren Schaeffer, and I believe in “play free.”
