VALENCIA (Jeff Taylor's Eurovision) - We'll never grow tired of hearing Maccabi Tel Aviv coach David Blatt speak after basketball games.

He is all things candor, humor and philosophy.

Blatt proved yet again recently that he takes a backseat to no one in the coaching profession after leading Maccabi to a Euroleague crown.

He understands the X's and O's of basketball, and excels at evaluating talent.

Blatt is a master of the mental part of the game.

He enjoys his basketball life.

Blatt is like a kid in the candy store.

We saw him in all his glory last week in Milan at the Euroleague Final Four.

His team stunned CSKA Moscow with a late comeback before shocking Real Madrid in the championship game.

Blatt then made us think about something far more important than sport.

"One of the greatest quotes I ever read in my life was in the last moments of Steven Jobs' life," he said.

"He was a great man. The last word he said was 'Wow'.

"Think about how wonderful that is, how positive that is, how optimistic that is. A man with his dying breath says 'wow'.

"That means he saw something going forward that gave us all some hope.

"I've been thinking about that for a long, long time because in basketball and in sport, every day isn't a great day.

"You have tough days, you have disappointments, obstacles, problems.

"And the way that you deal with those things and the attitude you take a lot of times determines whether or not you're going to be able to go forward and if you're going to be able to be successful.

"But most importantly as a coach is if you're going to be able to lead your men to bigger and better things or lead them out of the dark when they don't see."

It's been pure joy to watch Blatt coach over the years, to ask him questions and to write about him.

My first encounter with him was in 2001 at the SuproLeague Final Four in Paris, when he was an assistant to Maccabi coach Pini Gershon.

I asked Gershon a question in a press conference and he quipped: "Who told you to ask that? Him?" He looked at a gentleman behind me who was, I was later told, former Maccabi and Israel coach Ralph Klein.

Blatt put me at ease as I left the press conference and answered some questions.

He would go to have some extraordinary moments in the sport.

One happened in 2004-05 as the coach of Dynamo St Petersburg in Russia, a team that he led to a perfect 20-win season in the FIBA Europe League.

When Benetton Treviso coach Ettore Messina was offered the chance to lead CSKA Moscow, the Italians swooped for Blatt and he led that team to the 2006 Lega A title. The following year, Blatt's Benetton won the Coppa Italia.

Next came a magnificent success that no one saw coming, a EuroBasket 2007 gold medal in Madrid as the coach of Russia.

The Russians had suffered a Quarter-Final knockout at EuroBasket 2005 by eventual champions Greece.

They hired Blatt.

He once shared a story about his early days as Russia coach.

His team had drawn his ire after it slumped to a defeat at Belgium in their second qualifying game for EuroBasket 2007.

"After that loss," Blatt said, "I walked inside the locker room and went crazy, threw things around and told the players that now I understand why everybody, including myself, thought that Russia is a loser team.

"After that game, a lot of people back home said, this is the same old thing.

"They were saying Russia is just losers, but since that game everything has changed."

Boy, did it ever.

Blatt's Russia surprised Spain in the EuroBasket 2007 Final, with JR Holden hitting a game-winning jump shot in the waning seconds.

Some of his best national team coaching performances came at times when he didn't have anything close to a squad at full strength, like the 2010 FIBA World Championship in Turkey.

That hard-working Russia team reached the Quarter-Finals and battled the United States before falling, 89-79.

His performance with Maccabi this season has underlined his greatness.

Real Madrid, Barcelona and CSKA were hyped as potential winners, with Maccabi the underdogs.

I could see Blatt working as an NBA head coach, or even a head coach in the American college system.

Put him in charge of a big-time university and watch him go. He'd recruit well and also be an educator.

Why leave, though?

A citizen of Israel and a family man, at the helm of a Maccabi club with incredible fan support, there is no cause to go.

I felt a pang of regret during the 2012 FIBA Olympic Qualifying Tournament when Blatt told me that summer was likely his last as Russia coach.

The international game would be poorer without him.

Blatt hasn't gone away, though.

And we're all richer because of it.

Jeff Taylor

FIBA

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