"He's a smart cookie," he says of Baldwin, who he played club championship basketball with in Dunedin and hasn't met for almost a decade but is itching to catch up with as well as other mates of ex-Hawk Brendon Polyblank.
"I was just a young buck in my twenties and he was in his thirties," he says, finding traction in the northern hemisphere philosophy of full-court press the former Tall Blacks coach has embraced.
"You've always got to keep evolving in what you use with the different coaching philosophies out there."
Consequently it begs the question: "So what's different in what you're bringing to the NBL this season, Alf?"
He laughs before replying: "I've bought myself a new pair of shoes."
Jokes aside, Arlidge drops a bomb.
"It's my last year in the job. There you go, I've said it."
With his talented twins, Zachary (older by five minutes) and Oscar, in their early teens, Arlidge wants to spend more time with them.
No, even if last season's seventh-placed side make their first NBL play-offs since 1997 Arlidge will say sayonara.
"My boys are good soccer players," he says of Zachary who is a "damn good goalkeeper" while Oscar is a striker in their age-group representative team in the Deep South.
However, having played basketball for the past five months, the boys have found a stronger affiliation with a sport their 4-year-old brother, Archie, already adores. But that'll have to wait for now because Arlidge has some unfinished business with the Mark Dickel-captained Nuggets, who are playing their second match tonight after a 111-77 victory over Waitakere Rangers in Dunedin.
"They [Waitakere] are the new kids on the block, so they're still finding their feet."
The Hawks, no doubt, will be their first litmus test and Arlidge has been perceptive.
"Last week you guys didn't have Paora [Winitana], so the boys must have played well," he deduces, hoping to catch some of the footage on a live website coverage of the Hawks' 89-56 win over the Paul Henare-coached Southland Sharks here on Sunday.
That the Manawatu Jets pipped the Hawks 74-71 in Palmerston North in the opening-round upset result to instil a sense of self-belief in the Otago camp with a resounding "Yes, we can", Arlidge isn't forthcoming.
Instead, he finds comfort in the knowledge that Everard Bartlett isn't going to be in today's mix for the Hawks since the Perth Wildcats' exit in the Australian National Basketball League (ANBL) final a fortnight ago as the New Zealand Breakers sealed their treble of titles.
On paper the Nuggets' starting five will make even the most-fancied NBL franchise take a second look.
Joining Dickel in the five are imports Antoine Tisby and Akeem Wright, former Breaker BJ Anthony and Riki Buckrell.
Guard Hayden Allen will not be playing because of his commitment to the Breakers as development officer with the franchise's season-ending function in Auckland tonight.
For the record, in their only preseason match, the Nuggets beat the Sharks by 12 points in Gore without the services of both the imports and Dickel.
He hastens to add Henare also opted to leave a few key players out of his mix, too, that day.
Arlidge is quick to point out games aren't won on paper, as simple as a game of basketball maybe.
