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This may sound rhetorical and I might have missed something.... but where in the rules does it say anything about having "control" to bring the ball into play?
The rules require that the ball go OOB then in-bounds. There are very few guidelines about it. If the ball was legally OOB and then came in bounds it was a legal play.
I will state that this was a sloppy play, and at some level maybe you could bail a team out here but generally....
I think it becomes dangerous to read into the actions of the player here. I know we have had the discussion on advantage/disadvantage on violations, but generally if a player makes a poor dribble, a poor move that causes a travel, the hand comes under the ball etc, the official blows the whistle and calls the violation. I am still of the opinion that if we get into the business of saying whoops let's redo that we get into a dangerous territory that I am not sure I want to walk down.
Have you ever had a player OOB who picked up the ball and threw it to another player who was inbounds and wanted to throw it in? so they caught it and walked OOB? They didn't mean to violate but the ball was oob and went inbound and now its out again. It's a violation even if the player say whoops that's not what I wanted to do.
If in the circumstance that you describe a player tapped the ball to a player oob and taht player fumbled it. I will start a 5 second count because the 5 second count starts when the ball is at the disposal of the team. The ball became at the disposal of the team when the player in bounds tapped it back oob. I have had games where the player who tapped it OOB smacked it hard enough that the team had to run after it (if it had been the team who just scored there would have been a delay warning) If the tem is dumb enough to slap the ball and have the player making the inbound throw chase after it, why should they get a break? The 5 second count starts! (the other team would get a warning and then a T on subsequent offenses) but we would allow the offense to do it? ( and yes there are some coaches would figure it out that they could set up against a press by doing that or get their offense set up by making a player run after it) Not for me. Ball is a disposal of the team not a player. what they do is their problem. Plain and simple if a team doesnt want this problem to occur the coaches need to stress that they control their own destiny and the way they play on the floor
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