Well, we did what you all called. As the U, I had a flag for illegal touching by an ineligible player at the 40 but the R did not rule it an illegal forward pass. It was not intentionally incomplete to stop the clock or prevent loss of yardage(7-5-2d), but it was thrown into an area not occupied by an eligible A receiver (7-5-2c) so it meets the criteria for an illegal forward pass under the latter definition. The net was that had the ineligible not turned and caught the ball and it instead went incomplete, the R would have had an easy intentional grounding under (7-5-2d) and we would have enforced it from the 25 (2nd and 35 from A's 20), so the ineligible's illegal touching had the effect of moving the spot of enforcement 15 yards in A's favor. We enforced the illegal touching leaving it 2nd and 20 from A's 35, but continue to discuss the action. If it is not an illegal forward pass, it would make sense to teach your QB to dump the ball to an ineligible as a last resort before taking a sack because as long as he tries to catch it, you have illegal touching and the spot of enforcement for the same penalty result (5 yards Loss of Down for both intentional grounding and illegal touching) may be moved forward to the spot of touching by the officials.
FYI, A was down by about 40 points so this is a puzzle question, not a game deciding one, but I think food for thought. B's third string defense was in prevent zone coverage. A was streaking all 5 eligible receivers every play. Typically, an eligible will be in the blocking mass so the illegal touching would be the only call as the ball is thrown to an area with an eligible receiver. This was a rare case with nothing but ineligibles left to block.
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