Look how far he has come, the second-round pick with the famous last name whose fans admired him so that they would croon his first name with an eerie howl.

Out-of-towners were forgiven for interpreting the arena-wide hum for boos. However, when Luke Walton strode onto the floor Tuesday night in Anaheim, for his first preseason game as the head coach of the Lakers, there was no mistaking the group of fans near the Lakers bench, who warbled, “Luuuke.”

In his nine years as a reserve with the Lakers, Walton averaged 4.7 points in barely 17 minutes per game while stars such as Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol carried the franchise to a pair of championships. Yet, Walton developed a faithful following with grit and hustle and smarts. He was, simply, a player fans and the Lakers organization trusted to make the right play. To not screw up.

That trust has carried into Walton’s coaching career, where his admirers now include the players he is tasked with shepherding out of the abyss of three straight losing seasons.

They beam when asked about Walton, gush about the offense he is working to install.

“When he got hired,” Jordan Clarkson said during training camp in Santa Barbara, “I ran around my house for like five minutes. My friends will tell you. I jumped over the couch like three or four times in excitement.”

Since his days as a player, through a two-year stint as a Warriors assistant and a 39-4 record as interim head coach, this level of faith in Walton has been a constant.

Those around the Lakers are happy to tell you about it.

Take Brandon Ingram: “When he draws it up, everything good happens.”

And Clarkson: “We’re all buying in.”

Walton is 36, a first-time head coach and, despite his success with the Warriors, sports an official record of 0-0. Second-year guard Anthony Brown smiled when asked if he was enjoying these early days of the Walton Era, but grew silent when asked to pinpoint what Walton does to engender such confidence.

“I can’t explain it to you,” Brown said. “I just can’t put it in words.”

Clarkson tried.

“Just something about Luke,” he said.

‘SPECIAL SAUCE’

The moment Jesse Mermuys realized working for Luke Walton was going to be unlike any coaching job he’d had, the new Lakers assistant was wobbling on a surfboard off the coast of Laguna Niguel.

“I wasn’t excited about it when he told us we were doing that,” Mermuys said.

Walton had taken his coaching staff to a luxury hotel to go over schemes, swap drills and establish a coaching philosophy. The days were split into two three-hour sessions for three days. Work talk spilled over to dinner and beyond.

On the last day, Walton announced that he had arranged for surfing lessons for the entire staff, everyone from Jud Buechler, an experienced boarder who has taken surf vacations across the globe, to Brian Shaw who, according to Mermuys, struggled to balance on the board.

“It’s great to me to always kind of push the comfort zone a little bit and make it uncomfortable,” Walton said last week in Santa Barbara, “and surfing seemed like it was harmless and a fun thing to do and be able to laugh at each other.”

It was a strategy borrowed from Walton’s old boss, Warriors coach Steve Kerr, who took the Golden State coaching staff on a Napa Valley retreat, which included a croquet tournament.

Surfing in the Pacific, though? That is a uniquely Walton approach, said Mermuys, who last season coached the Toronto Raptors Development League affiliate.

“Whatever he has,” Mermuys said, “his special sauce and vibe is very contagious. It infiltrates his staff, and how we coach and talk. Players kind of pick up on it and feel it. So I think it just creates a different environment.”

What goes unsaid, but is widely understood, is that the environment stands in stark contrast to the one established by Walton’s predecessor, the hard-nosed Byron Scott.

Like Walton, Scott was hailed as a member of the Lakers family, brought in to right the ship. Scott, however, struggled to earn the trust of young players and to establish a team identity.

“You can’t really compare coaches,” Metta World Peace said. “You can’t compare the times. Last year was different. Under those circumstances, you have young players, rookies and Kobe on his way out. You can’t compare it. It’s not fair to anybody.”

With that disclaimer out of the way, the veteran, four months older than Walton, turned the attention to his former teammate.

“Some people are naturally gifted athletes,” World Peace said, “he’s naturally into this position.”

He added: “I’m learning so much.”

RELATABLE MENTOR

It was the third day of training camp, and Larry Nance Jr. rested in a folding chair at the edge of a court at UC Santa Barbara.

“The puke cans weren’t out here, that’s for sure,” he said.

He is referring to the large trash bins Scott spaced along the sideline during conditioning drills, designed to be so grueling players would vomit.

“There’s some coaches in the past that kind of beat you down,” Shaw said. “Tear you apart and then they try to build you back up, (Walton) is not like that at all. He makes everybody feel comfortable and you want to play for him. He’s a players’ coach, definitely.

In contrast to Scott, Walton prefers to mix conditioning into drills. If the team is running, they are probably running a fast break.

“If we can run for a purpose or run in a scrimmage or pick-up,” Nance said, “that’s so much better than get on the line, senseless running.”

Walton’s own playing career ended just three years ago, a fact commonly pointed to when players are asked why they find the new coach so relatable.

As training camp invitees go, former UCLA star Travis Wear is fairly grizzled. He played 51 games with the New York Knicks in 2014-15, in Derek Fisher’s first season at the helm. He also spent time in summer league with the Atlanta Hawks. Walton’s training camp, he said, was unlike anything he had experienced.

“He’s so charismatic and easy to get along with,” Wear said. “He’s really good at being the coach in the locker room and then off the court he’s really good at being one of us, and just one of the guys and communicating and letting loose.”

Walton is endlessly positive. Julius Randle is a “phenomenal” athlete and Ingram is “great” and he is “so impressed” by rookie Ivica Zubac.

“He praises all of us on the court,” Clarkson said. “He’s always on top of us. He can relate to us.”

TRUST THE FIT

The hype is part of what makes Walton nervous. As a player, he was a hero if he came in and scored six points, dove after a loose ball and zipped a pass to Bryant for an open 3-pointer. The turnaround of the organization is now largely on his shoulders; his players expect it of him.

“I don’t want to let them down,” Walton said. “It seems like they’re going to buy in and trust what we’re teaching. What we’re teaching better be right. Otherwise that’s a really (expletive) feeling. If you’re leading and you’re not leading the right way.”

He thinks about players like Ingram, a rookie who knows no other way in the NBA. Of Clarkson and his new contract and the responsibility that comes with it. Of Nance, Julius Randle and D’Angelo Russell.

“This is their dream they’re living,” he said. “This is what they come in the gym two or three times a day to do so the pressure is that you’re hopefully giving them the best chance of winning.”

When Walton stepped onto the court at Honda Center on Tuesday, a low moan rising among the crowd, he felt the weight of the moment.

“It was awesome,” he said after the Lakers logged an exhibition win over the Sacramento Kings. “Once the game started you don’t ever think about it again, but walking out there, next to B-Shaw, was a pretty special feeling.”

It seems to be mutual, as Walton’s players and the fans of this team he now commands have placed their trust entirely in him.

Mermuys believes it wise to do so.

“As coaches you just want to evolve with the time,” he said. “I think for this day and age, right now, he is a great fit for a young basketball team.”

Contact the writer: boram@scng.com