Nobody in college baseball pulled off the combo of respectability and unpredictability quite like Air Force’s Mike Kazlausky.

Losing Kaz from his coaching position is a hit to the public-facing personality of the academy. He’ll continue to make an impact as he moves to his role as director of leadership and institutional strategy, but he’ll be irreplaceable in what he brought to the Falcons as a coach and interview subject.

A graduate and former pilot, Kaz lived, understood and explained the greater mission of the Air Force through a unique lens.

“Warheads on foreheads,” he would say of the upcoming mission for the graduates the academy was sending to “kill bad guys” by turning them into “pink mist.”

I can only imagine the headaches Kaz and his blunt language caused for those in Air Force’s sports information department and the leaders up the chain.

But because of the way he said it with a matter-of-fact sincerity and enthusiasm, he managed to make it endearing.

He was all in, underscored by the fact that he sent both his son and daughter to the academy.

That complete buy-in helped him attract a certain kind of high-achieving young man, even by service academy standards. Every year the list of postgraduate jobs for the baseball team would overwhelmingly lean toward pilot training, graduate school or special forces – spots reserved for the cream of the crop at a school that accepts only the cream of the crop from the nation.

Kaz would tell recruits to go somewhere they’ll be celebrated, not tolerated. And he sung the praise of the players who made that choice every chance he was given. He never forgot that every player on his roster had raised his hand in a pledge to, if necessary, die for this country. Anytime he was in front of a microphone, he reiterated that point.

The atmosphere he created led to one of the most improbable success stories in college baseball. This is a program that faces all the normal challenges of service academy teams – the military commitment, academic standards, etc. Added to that, they can rarely practice outdoors during the offseason because of the Colorado winters. The first month of the season is generally spent on the road. All the better, Kaz would say, as the future battles his players were going to fight wouldn’t be on home soil.

The Falcons hadn’t had a winning season since 1984 when Kaz took over in 2011. He changed that with a 30-27 mark in 2016, and the team parlayed that into a run of .500 or better in five of six seasons. The team had gone 18-183 within the Mountain West in the eight years before his arrival. He turned it into conference a champion. Twice. The Falcons took the regular-season crown in 2024 and in the tournament in 2022.

Part of the strategy was playing anybody who would schedule them. In the past six seasons the Falcons have played ranked teams from, among others, Arizona, Auburn, Dallas Baptist, LSU, Texas and Texas Tech.

“Have you ever known me not to schedule hard teams? That’s our thing,” Kazlausky told The Gazette prior to the 2025 season-opening event that included five games in six days against No. 10 Florida and No. 15 Vanderbilt. “I don’t give a crap. My thought and mentality is we’re going to make warfighters, so we better play the best teams our country has to offer.”

If you were a young man who maybe felt overlooked in recruiting, this was the magnetic personality that made you want to join and wrap yourself in a flag.

And in droves, those players signed up.

Griffin Jax, a 2017 Air Force graduate, now pitches for the Tampa Bay Rays after becoming the first graduate from the program to reach the majors.

“Kaz has a special ability to connect and impact everyone around him,” Jax told The Gazette this week.

Paul Skenes has rocketed to superstardom and the NL Cy Young Award after spending his first two seasons at Air Force.

“He has impacted thousands of lives and executed his mission statement as well as anyone I’ve ever met,” Skenes said upon hearing Kaz was leaving coaching. “Literally no words that can do him justice.”

Sam Kulasingam, a two-time Tony Gwynn Award winner as Mountain West Player of the Year, came through under Kazlausky. So did Jay Thomason, also a Tony Gwynn Award winner and the Mountain West’s all-time home run leader.

Leadership is not a one-size-fits-all endeavor. No one could – or should – mimic Kazlausky’s style. Kaz seemed to have no choice but to be Kaz. He was one of one.

Surely that restless quest for excellence will translate to his new role, but it’s likely to occur in ways we won’t see. As for the public-facing personality of the entire institution, it will be inevitably less colorful without him.