As someone who played for the Sacramento Kings and Toronto Raptors in the NBA before joining the Miami Heat in the middle of last season, point guard Davion Mitchell wasn’t sure what to expect from the “Heat way” upon joining the team.

Recently, he opened about that experience and detailed how it all played out.

“Coming into when I got traded to the Heat, I didn’t really know what to expect ’cause you hear so many different stories, right?” Mitchell said. “You hear so many, like, ‘Oh, Pat Riley’s this. You gotta work extremely hard. You gotta do all this.’

“And then when I got there, I’m like literally waiting for what’s about to happen. The first practice, I’m like, alright, are we about to run? Even in season, alright, are we about to do some sprints? I don’t know. I’m just kinda just waiting.

“I think people don’t really know unless you’re in it, and I think that the Heat way is just more of a — it’s not military. You don’t gotta wear a certain thing. I just think they want you to do everything extremely hard and put everything for it, right? If you got something to deal with, worry about practice right now, right?

“And it’s just like every other team, I just think they’re just more disciplined, right? I think that in practice, no earrings, have your shirt tucked in sometimes. I don’t know. I think it was just also more chill because I came during the middle of the season, right? So I don’t really know what the actual way is during training camp. … It could be crazy. Who knows.

“… But I don’t really know what people opinions are. I just know when I got there, it was just a team way. It was just a regular team way.”

Mitchell came over to the Heat as part of the five-team trade that sent veteran forward Jimmy Butler to the Golden State Warriors.

Upon joining the Heat, Mitchell proved to be a very fun fit. In the regular season, he appeared in 30 games and got 15 starts with Miami. He averaged 10.3 points, 5.3 assists and 2.7 rebounds per game on incredible efficiency, as he knocked down 50.4 percent of his shots from the field and 44.7 percent of his shots from deep.

Then, when the postseason arrived, he took his game to another level. Across the play-in tournament and playoffs, the Heat appeared in six games. Mitchell scored 15-plus points in five of them and had five-plus assists in all of them. Some of his scoring performances were remarkably efficient.

Mitchell did enough following the trade to earn a new deal with the Heat this offseason. He inked a two-year contract worth $24 million with the team, putting him in position to be a key part of their backcourt rotation moving forward.

Much has been said about the “Heat way” or the team’s vaunted culture over the years, but regardless of one’s opinion on it, Mitchell seems like a fantastic fit for a franchise known for its grit and intensity. Although the Butler trade stung for a lot of Heat fans and marked the end of an era, Mitchell is already looking like a nice snag as part of Miami’s return.

He’ll look to help the team get back to relevance in the Eastern Conference after the team was nowhere close to being a threat this past season. Despite Mitchell’s strong postseason efforts, the Heat were swept in the first round.