LAS VEGAS — Mikal Bridges didn’t talk his way into a career breakthrough last season, or becoming the Nets’ leader this season.

He worked his way into it.

Talk is cheap. But real Leadership — the kind Bridges has earned from his teammates and coaches — is expensive, paid for with sweat equity.

But with the Nets set to tip off the preseason Monday versus the Lakers, it’s a responsibility he’s ready to shoulder.

“It’s just exciting. … I could talk about it all I want. I could talk about, ‘I’m going do this, I’m going to do that, we’re going to win games,’ but you don’t know until you play,” Bridges said. “It’s a new role. Personally I think I can fulfill it and succeed in it with who I am as a person. I’m willing to take every bullet, take the blame for losing: I’m ready for all that. Personally, I think I’m ready, but we’ll see.

“Who wouldn’t want this? Who wouldn’t want this type of pressure, this type of expectations? If you really love the game and really want to be the best you can be, you’d want this …where you’re the main guy and everything’s on your shoulders. What are you going to do? How I’m raised and where I came from with the things I’ve been through, I feel like I’m ready for the moment and always have been.”

Bridges was the centerpiece of the Kevin Durant trade, blossoming in Brooklyn as he averaged 26.1 points and 4.5 rebounds in 27 games.

But that was dropped midseason into a mishmash of players from the Nets, Suns and Mavs. Now here from Day 1 of camp, he has more of an ability to lead.

“[It’s] way better. Just being around the guys and being comfortable enough where we’re all here starting from the beginning … [not] joining a different team halfway,” Bridges said after Saturday’s practice at UNLV. “So just building relationships off the court makes it easier going on the court and voicing things.”

Both his teammates and coaches say Bridges isn’t just talking to talk. He’s always been a sponge, whether that was absorbing things from Chris Paul and Devin Booker in Phoenix or Team USA mates in this summer’s FIBA World Cup.

But since returning, he’s been doing extra film work with Jacque Vaughn, and picking his brain in meetings.

“He has an understanding of what we want to do and will ask questions,” Vaughn said. “That’s leadership, to be vulnerable enough to when I’m [saying] ‘All right, anybody have anything?’ and some guys don’t ask a question, he’ll ask a question. That’s part of leadership, so that the whole group is in alignment.

“We’re going to encourage and really put him in a position where everyone’s talking and communicating, but in a position where usually when you’re talking in a setting like that, you know what you’re talking about, or else you don’t talk. So it puts him in a position to know what we’re doing.”

Multiple Nets cited Bridges as stepping into a leadership role, both in the locker room and on the court.

“It’s a beautiful thing. It shows what he’s capable of. It shows the level of player he is. From year in and year out, he’s only been improving,” Lonnie Walker IV said. “So for him to go from the Suns to over here and … do what he’s doing, it’s no surprise. He works very hard to get to where he got to. He’s also a leader: He knows the game really well, inside and out.”

And that work ethic has allowed him to not just add the 3-pointer, midrange jumper and pick-and-roll to the off-ball cutting skills he brought into the league; it’s also made him a leader, and an iron man who’s logged 392 straight games — third-longest in NBA history.

“It’s all in the work,” Cam Johnson said. “He’s been willing to put in the work every day of his career. And he’s an everyday guy. He shows up, every day. He’s available, and he commits himself to getting better. … You just watch over time, you can see such a natural progression of skill, of the ability to change games, take over games.

“So just putting that all together, continuing that momentum. He’s going to continue working. It’s not a matter of ‘OK, I’m good, I’m here.’ Nah. He’s going to put in the work. … Every day I’ve been around him, this is what he’s been about. So he’s definitely capable of continuing that momentum that he built up toward the end of last year and taking it into some really positive things.”