CR: The major red flag to me right now is that he is a bit of a black hole. It hits his hands and some way some how it’s going up. This is an ongoing issue for him as well. Although he didn’t play a ton at Kansas as a freshman, he still managed 202 total minutes played and in that span he had a whopping one assist — one! That’s rather astounding when you think about the talent he had around him in college as well. The trend continued to his D-League play — especially early — as he’s amassed a total of 18 assists in 724 minutes of play. One thing of note however is over the last two months he’s gotten 13 of those 18 assists, so it appears he is cognoscente of the problem and is working to remedy it.

MG: The lack of assists is a great point which makes me wonder if pairing him with Anthony Davis could be a challenge at times since AD also struggles to find open teammates (despite all of the attention that he garners). Definitely something to keep an eye on moving forward. Speaking of moving forward – assuming the Pelicans accept their “non-playoff” fate in the near future, how much (if at all) would heavy NBA minutes down the stretch this season benefit Diallo’s development?

CR: I’m always of the thought that there is no replacement for NBA minutes. If the Pelicans want to play the let’s-see-what-we-got game with the 20-year-old Diallo, I think it would be beneficial. Diallo is far from a finished product, but (if he’s willing to assume the right role) he can contribute as early as next season for New Orleans based on what I have seen. He’s also shown an ability to hit mid-range jump shots this season as he’s knocked down 51-of-127 (40.2 percent) of those attempts. That skill would be super helpful for him to continue to harness, so that he could easily play alongside Anthony Davis and/or DeMarcus Cousins and provide spacing for either of them to operate in the paint.

MG: We are in total agreement on that one; I would love to see Diallo get more NBA minutes over the Pelicans’ final eight games. Hard to think of a better way to make the transition than playing alongside guys like AD and Boogie. Let me push you a bit further on that comment about next year – what kind of contributions do you think Diallo could realistically make for the Pelicans in the 2017-18 season?

MG: That attention to detail is really encouraging, both for Diallo and for the organization as a whole. To wrap up, I have one more “bonus” question that falls just a bit outside the scope of our discussion up until now. Last season, you asked myself and a few others about our thoughts on the fact that the NBA teams that we cover don’t have D-League affiliates. In your expert opinion, how big of a problem is the Pelicans’ lack of a D-League team? The most recent impact is that Diallo has played for three different D-League teams this year instead of one – does that matter at all?

CR: It’s a problem, but not a massive one at this point. Diallo has played 26 total games (15 with Greensboro, 9 with Austin and 2 with Long Island) this season in the D-League and with each new team his role, minutes and expectations fluctuate. That can become an issue with a very young talent like Diallo, but he’s really taken it in stride to his credit. He comes across as a wildly confident player — sometimes almost arrogant — so that has assisted him during his time behind the scenes in the D-League. The bigger issue is that he is running other teams’ offenses, defenses and schemes and he’s not becoming immersed in those things as they pertain to New Orleans specifically. It equates to more work for him ultimately, and more work for the team depending on how quickly he can pick up their stuff over the summer.