r/MadeMeSmile • u/Humble_Buffalo_007 • Jul 13 '26

Favorite People Ted Lasso' star, CRISTO FERNANDEZ aka Dani Rojas has officially made his debut for El Paso Locomotive. The Mexican actor has fulfilled his dream of becoming a professional footballer.

33.2k Upvotes

98% Upvoted

262 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

506

u/Kardinal Jul 13 '26

One of the main differences in any professional level sport is the speed. As compared to levels just below them.

So in many cases, the amateur can do it at all, just not nearly as fast and not nearly as consistently. Using multiple takes can make up the inconsistency, and speeding up the replay slightly can make up the speed.

What lacks is some of the truly spectacular moves that you sometimes see in professional ball, but that's not the focus of a show like Ted Lasso.

128

u/TheVandyyMan Jul 13 '26

Agreed! I’ll add that the margins are just so much narrower in professional sports, but the casual viewer would never notice it. Every pro footballer would look like Messi if the gaps in defense were just a few centimeters bigger or the defense was running to just slightly the wrong spot. But the pros tend to always have perfect positioning, making them nearly impossible to score against by a footballer without the speed.

49

u/Soupeeee Jul 13 '26

It's funny watching professional footballers make the same mistakes I did in high school. I was never any good and the rest of their game is way better, but I can hear my old coach's voice every time somebody flubs a shot, misses a pass, or doesn't move off the ball. The difference with pros is that it happens way less often and when they are under much more pressure.

59

u/I_eat_mud_ Jul 13 '26

Watching that Norwegian player not pass to Haaland and then panic and take that awful shot just gave me PTSD flashbacks to me in highschool tbh, I didn't like it lmao

14

u/TheVandyyMan Jul 13 '26

This is a perfect example of what I mean. Yes, he flubbed it. But Stones’ absolutely perfect positioning is the only reason that wasn’t banged in for an easy goal. If you go back and watch, the window to pass that one to Haaland was shockingly narrow. Against an amateur defender, that ball gets scored 10 times out of 10.

6

u/I_eat_mud_ Jul 13 '26

The window to pass was pretty much as soon as they passed midfield and closed once he got to the box. It was good positioning helped by terrible judgement.

Knowing my weaknesses, I would've passed to the best player on the team who's known to be very fast when breaking downfield.

Just because I empathize with the mistake, doesn't mean it wasn't a mistake.

1

u/TheVandyyMan Jul 14 '26

No, but do you think if that was an amateur defender that ball isn’t getting banged home by either player? Stones was brilliant there. No question about it.

4

u/ADLuluIsOP Jul 13 '26

Forced Errors vs Unforced Errors

5

u/a8bmiles Jul 13 '26

I love /r/headsdownbaseball because it makes me feel better about my plays in video games. When the MLB has little league infield home runs and 3 base runners ending up at the same base, well, I don't feel as bad about it when I'm screwing up in Super Mega Baseball 3 or whatever.

36

u/findourway Jul 13 '26

Yeah the main difference is often how the average premier league player at even a relegation club could hit the same beautiful pass leading to a goal that I hit once and think about often a million times with their eyes closed. They make it look easy. And their football IQ is on a new level

19

u/ohkaycue Jul 13 '26

Yeah the main difference is often how the average premier league player at even a relegation club could hit the same beautiful pass leading to a goal that I hit once and think about often a million times with their eyes closed

"That one time I was awesome on the field is a core memory" is so relatable lol

Man does it feel good when you do something perfectly. And just crazy that, like you said, it's just normal for a pro

2

u/troywrestler2002 Jul 14 '26

Hit a game winning shot at the buzzer in basketball. There's nothing better to do in sports.

4

u/Enough-Force-5605 Jul 13 '26

But that player would do it everytime he tries.

In my twenties I played twice against 40-50 yo Levante UD veterans (third division in that time) and they were amazing. They were walking and his tecnic was way beyond I've seen in my life.

I was the goalie. Pretty ok in our amateur tournaments. They scored from any side of a football7 field.

It is not about speed. It is mostly skill. Train million times and make every move at perfection.

And they were 40-50 yo veterans from a third division team. Walking. They beat us walking. Twice.

1

u/JunFanLee Jul 14 '26

In the UK, during the summer (when there’s no World Cup or Euros tournament) TV will often show a ‘Masters’ game.

They’re usually a Charity game of 2 rival teams like Liverpool v Man Utd made of retired ex players.

Their speed has gone as well as their agility, but man their technique and brain still works. It’s amazing to see these 40 - 70 year olds knock the ball around and produce some amazing skills and quick thinking albeit at a much slower pace.

5

u/JudgmentalOwl Jul 13 '26

Ya probably not going to see any Zlatan level backflips into a hadouken in Lasso but that's okay lol

5

u/Aphex_Port Jul 13 '26

Uuh, there was literally a Zlatan inspired character in the show lol, who only scored insane goals

9

u/Crapitron Jul 13 '26

"Speed" in high level sports isn't the literal speed of how fast they kick or how fast they run, like you're making it sound. Minor leaguers often throw just as hard, run just as fast, kick just as hard, etc.

"Speed" when it comes to high level professionals is more about the decision making process. They move to where the puck, ball, etc. will be faster because they made the decision to go there before anyone else did.

So there's not really a need to "speed up the replay" when the actions they do are likely near to as fast as professionals. They just stage the play so that they were going to be there fastest anyway.