Various Nets have come into training camp looking visibly different, from Day\u2019Ron Sharpe and Cam Thomas having gotten leaner to Egor D\u00ebmin having gotten bigger. <\/p>\n
But none reshaped their body more than Noah Clowney.<\/p>\n
The once-willowy big man finally qualifies as big, and finally looks like a grown man instead of a young one. <\/p>\n
Nets forward Noah Clowney speaks at the team\u2019s media day on Sept. 23, 2025. Imagn Images<\/p>\n
Clowney packed on muscle in the offseason, added weight that he and the Nets figure will help shore up the weak parts of his game.<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, [Clowney] looks great,\u201d said coach Jordi Fern\u00e1ndez. \u201cCredit to him and the work he\u2019s put in the whole summer. He looks like a grown man at just 21.<\/p>\n
\u201c[I\u2019m] excited to watch him play real games. Obviously you\u2019ve got to go through training camp and the preseason games, but he\u2019s done a great job. His ability to shoot, his size and getting better at playing off two feet in the paint, limiting turnovers and fishing better at the rim. So those things are important for him.\u201d<\/p>\n
The added bulk should help toward that end.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s been the whole goal, being a better driver,\u201d Clowney said. \u201cI have to get stronger, I have to be able to drive through contact and be able to still be able to explode.\u201d<\/p>\n
Noah Clowney came into camp a year ago listed at 210 pounds but says he was over 220 during the season. Corey Sipkin for New York Post<\/p>\n
After coming into camp a year ago listed at 210 pounds, and saying he played last season at various times between 220 and 225 pounds, Clowney tipped the scales last week at a solidly built 234 pounds.<\/p>\n
Physically, he looked more like starting center Nic Claxton than the waifish youngster who struggled to finish last season.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of [NBA] players have been top athletes all their lives and when they get to this level, they just think they\u2019re going to go to the rim, jump and finish. And a lot of times they\u2019ve never had to figure it out,\u201d Fern\u00e1ndez said. \u201cChallenging centers in the best league in the world is not necessarily a good thing.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of times the best finishers are guys that\u2019ve never been that gifted early on, and they had to find a way to play, to be better decision-makers and finish when you have the advantage. So it\u2019s part of the process. As coaches, we need to figure that out, so it\u2019s a good challenge. Our players are buying into it. And we want to be a better finishing team because last year, we were a poor finishing team.\u201d<\/p>\n
That certainly wasn\u2019t helped by Clowney\u2019s woes.<\/p>\n
He largely inherited the power forward spot after Dorian Finney-Smith was traded. <\/p>\n
Noah Clowney\u2019s statistics indicate issues scoring within 10 feet of the rim. Robert Sabo for NY Post<\/p>\n
But while Clowney\u2019s shooting touch helped space the floor, he\u2019s going to have to round out his game and do more than just camp out in the corner.<\/p>\n
Clowney ranked in just the fourth percentile on 2-point shots, per Cleaning the Glass. <\/p>\n
And his horrid 45.3 percent shooting within 10 feet of the rim was fifth worst in the entire league among all players 6-foot-7 or taller with at least 50 attempts. <\/p>\n
That has to improve, as does his rebounding.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s where the added muscle comes in.<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, I think it helps. Numbers, the games will tell us what it is, but that\u2019s the reality,\u201d Fern\u00e1ndez said. \u201cNoah was a good rebounder. Now that he\u2019s stronger, he\u2019ll be a better rebounder. That\u2019s my assumption.\u201d<\/p>\n
The visible changes to Clowney\u2019s arms, chest and shoulders can make a difference trying to explode through contact. <\/p>\n
Better decision-making from the third-year pro can make just as much on drives.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn transition, it\u2019ll be downhill. It\u2019s easy because everyone\u2019s not loaded, and it\u2019s the easiest way you can get there and just being able to play off two [feet],\u201d Clowney said. \u201cI did a lot of bump Euros off of one [foot], you got a foot in front, and you have to make a decision and not turn it over.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Various Nets have come into training camp looking visibly different, from Day\u2019Ron Sharpe and Cam Thomas having gotten…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":189170,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[671,355,99],"class_list":["post-189169","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-brooklyn-nets","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189169","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=189169"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189169\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/189170"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=189169"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=189169"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=189169"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}