AN EARLY RISER
Cleanthony starting to hit his stride in Year 2 as a Knick
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — There were lots of problems last season as a rookie — so many Cleanthony Early doesn’t have time to go through them all as he puts on sneakers in the locker room and heads onto the court for pregame warmups.
But that’s in the past. Now the 34th pick of the 2014 draft is getting unsolicited kudos from Knicks coach Derek Fisher as he embarks on what has appearances of a much more successful sophomore campaign.
Team president Phil Jackson’s firstever draft pick looks leaner, less tentative, is defending harder, getting his nose dirty. The 6foot8 small forward even has a more comfortable jersey number — 11 — which he wore at Wichita State and Sullivan County CC in the Catskills.
The 24yearold Bronx product who played high school ball in upstate Orange County lost five pounds from last season’s disaster of a rookie year and resumed yoga, which he did in college.
“Going into a new situation, you know it’s more physical, but you don’t know how physical it is until you get there,’’ Early told The Post before Saturday’s preseason game. “You know it’s fast. You don’t know how fast until you get there.’’
Early looked splendid in Friday’s win over Boston, scoring 10 points, grabbing an offensive rebound that led to an assist, scoring on a wicked fastbreak dunk, cutting sharply to the basket to take a feed for a layup, draining a 3pointer. The Knicks are versatile, deep and erratic combo forward Derrick Williams is scoring in bunches. But Fisher seems to want to find some minutes for Early as a backup 3 because he’s uptempo.
“He looks more confident this year,’’ Carmelo Anthony said. “I think it was good for him to go through the season last year, this offseason and even right now he looks a lot more confident.’’
Early wore 17 last season because departed Samuel Dalembert had his “11.’’
“I just feel more connected to this number,’’ Early said.
Fisher has gone out of his way to praise Early after they had issues his rookie year for not being in proper shape. Early blames a lot of his troubles with November’s arthroscopic knee surgery in November. He didn’t return until January and was woefully out of shape. That partly was because of the Knicks being so injuryriddled, they had so few practices to get Early going.
“It wasn’t just weight last year — people don’t know I didn’t do any basketball stuff until I got thrown on the court, Early said. “My conditioning was part of me going to the DLeague [for three games]. I gave up a monthandahalf not doing any basketball or conditioning. [When I came back], I was out there running, getting winded while trying to play basketball.’’
Early’s knee surgery and assorted ankle sprains convinced him to get back to yoga, which he does it daily at home.
“I did it at Wichita State here and there, wasn’t anything consistent,’’ Early said. “I thought it would help as far as me becoming more in alignment and flexible — be a better defender and better basketball player. I just started doing it more often and feel it’s working. After surgery it was something I needed to do to become more flexible, stay on top of certain correctives, stretching — yoga incorporates all that.’’
If Early turns into a competent twoway force, that’s more rest for Anthony, who has taken a special interest and will get on the secondyear wing. During training camp, Anthony relentlessly teased Early for getting dunked on by Thanasis Antetokounmpo. Early protested it wasn’t his man.
“He’s like a big brother pretty much since I came in,’’ said Early, averaging 5.5 points, 3.5 rebounds, 1.5 assists in 20 minutes while having a plus7.3 rating. “As far as telling me to relax and play basketball, he compliments me on the things I do good, and things he sees I can improve on, gives me the best advice possible.’’