Brett Brown's face shows scarcely a wrinkle, there are no bags under his eyes and his silver hair is perfectly in place.
Given the record of his current team, the former Sydney Kings, North Melbourne Giants and Australian Olympic men's basketball team coach should be a physical and mental wreck.
But the 53-year-old is happy, confident and content.
"This is my DNA," Brown says.
"I'm a Type A personality."
Brown is bullish despite being the head coach of one of America's worst sports teams, the Philadelphia 76ers.
Since joining the NBA club in 2013 he has a 37-win, 117-loss record.
The 76ers lost their first 17 games of the current season.
They lost 26 in a row the previous year.
Earlier this week Brown was standing outside the visitor's locker room located deep inside the bowels of the Los Angeles Lakers' arena, the 20,000 seat Staples Center.
"I knew from day one when I got the job it was going to be my greatest challenge," said Brown, who thrives on keeping his young team focused on improving.
The 76ers, Lakers and other woeful teams, the New York Knicks and Minnesota Timberwolves, are in an NBA race.
Team managements won't admit it publicly, but the four clubs are in a race to have the worst record in the NBA.
Adding to the Bizarro World landscape, many of their fans cheer the losses and boo the wins because in the NBA the worst team has the best chance of securing the best player in June's NBA Draft.
On a recent night in LA the 76ers won when the Lakers easily beat them 101-87.
Brown, a successful assistant under Gregg Popovich at the San Antonio Spurs, knew the 76ers were in a major re-building phase when he took the job.
That's why he demanded a guaranteed four-year deal, which ensured he collected every dollar of his reported $US8 million contract even if the team fired him early.
The 76ers' plan seems to be to compile a squad of young, but cheap, talent through the draft, with the 76ers picking up elite, but injured, big men Nerlens Noel and Joel Embiid and 2014 rookie of the year, point guard Michael Carter-Williams.
But, in a move that 76ers fans are still shaking their heads at, management traded Carter-Williams last month for a first round draft pick.
Brown, born in Maine, speaks with a New England accent with a touch of Australiana following his almost two decades downunder.
A point guard under legendary college coach Rick Pitino at Boston University, Brown took a trip to Australia in 1993 and made an unannounced visit to Australia's own iconic coach, Lindsay Gaze, at the NBL's Melbourne Tigers.
The young American was hired by Gaze as an assistant and he fell in love with local girl Anna. He stayed, had a family, became head coach of the NBL's Giants and Kings and went to three Olympics with the Boomers.
Despite achieving so much, one of Brown's greatest honours came recently when he received an invitation from Gaze.
The 78-year-old has asked Brown and Anna to be with him in Springfield, Massachusetts, in September when Gaze is inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.
"I wouldn't miss it for anything," Brown said.
The seasons are long with the 76ers, the losses are many, but Brown says the tutelage from Gaze has helped him in Philadelphia.
"There is a calmness in Lindsay that influenced me," Brown said.
"He was still truly competitive, but he had a tremendous perspective and those lessons still stay with me."
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