A Millennial’s take on Steve Masiello’s rant

Those darn millennials are at it again!

Manhattan head coach Steve Masiello had some things to say about a “fraudulent generation” in his postgame press conference on Sunday, moments after his team dropped its third straight game.

Here’s the TL;DW for those of you Millennials with short attention spans:

Masiello: Questions?

Reporter: You're a young team that's still learning how to play together-

Masiello: We're not young.

Reporter (cont'd, not to be dismayed by the interruption): How do you adjust to playing from behind?

Masiello: We're a fraudulent society from top to bottom. Our society's fraudulent. Everything about our society is edited. Everything about our society is prearranged so this generation is a fraudulent generation. And what I mean by that is they put their Instagram picture the way they want. They put their tweet out the way they want. Nothing is interactive. Nothing is real so when things don't go the way people want them to, people really struggle with if it's not 75 degrees and sunny and the stars aren't aligned, if it's not exactly 4 p.m., they didn't get exactly eight hours of beauty sleep... young people today struggle with it. Our society struggles with that, and for me--I can't speak for other coaches--I see it more than ever. When adversity comes in, people struggle. They're not bad kids. This might be one of my favorite groups I've ever had. They struggle with adversity. They struggle with--that's a byproduct of our society today, so I think we're a reflection of our culture a little bit, not to get too deep.

The rant clearly shows Masiello’s frustration as his team dropped to 7-14 overall and a league-worst 2-8 in the MAAC. Is it fair to blame their shortcomings on society as a whole? Probably not!

This is the same Masiello who had the South Florida job all but locked up until it came out that he had lied on his resume. His resume stated that Masiello had earned his degree from the University of Kentucky when, in fact, he had not. The South Florida offer was soon revoked.

Three years later, Manhattan is well on its way to a second-straight losing season.

Let’s dive into the rant a little bit deeper.

Masiello believes that everything about society is prearranged, and that has made college-aged kids, AKA Millennials, a “fraudulent generation.”

He goes on to harp on this by saying that we (yes, I’m a dumb Millennial too) post our Instagram photos and tweets how we want. But that’s exactly the point of social media. It is meant to be an expression of ourselves and our personality, so apologies in advance for not catering to the desires of other generations.

Masiello then goes on to say that young people struggle when it isn’t 75 degrees out or if they don’t get exactly eight hours of sleep. And he actually makes a good point! We prefer to be well-rested and we enjoy nice weather. Much like almost every human on Earth.

He finishes his rant by saying that his players struggle with adversity (which everyone does. Adversity is, by definition, a struggle), and that those struggles are a byproduct of our society and culture.

Well, isn’t it a coach’s job to stand by his players and guide them through the tough times? Wouldn’t it make sense for him to take more responsibility?

It’s clear that Masiello is unhappy with his team’s performance and he may not see much positivity to take away from it. But going on a rant about your players’ generation is an easy way to lose their trust both now and in the future.

I hope, for his sake, that Masiello steps back and evaluates what he can do to strengthen the program moving forward, rather than complaining about everything his players are not.