I believe I have been right, but for the wrong reasons. I finally consulted the [NHHS] Rules Book (what a novel concept) -
Special thanks to BktBallRef, mick, Jurassic Referee, and Hawks Coach for "fighting" me on my concepts of player control, passing, and traveling--they showed me the way: But, they may disagree with my new way also; we'll see. Apologies to all I may have confused, especially to Tom Cook and wsisco.
Now the Real Story:
Setting the ball on the floor is a pass (it is a ball which is rolled zero feet). If setting the ball on the floor were not a pass, then a player could not set it on the floor and run away without being called for traveling.
By definition, a pass occurs when you roll, bat, or throw the ball to ANOTHER player. However in order for the traveling rules to work, there are some unwritten properties of the PASS:
1)In addition to players, a pass may be made to the playing court, to OOB, to your own backboard, to either basket, and to SELF.
2)If a player has passed, they cannot be the first to touch that pass after moving their pivot; the violation is traveling.
3)The start of a dribble is not a pass; a try is not a pass; [a fumble is not a pass; dribbling is not passing]
Therefore, all the restrictions which apply to player movement for a player holding the ball, also apply to a player involved in self-passing.
Definition: PLAYER CONTROL is holding or dribbling a live ball [while in-bounds].
Given: A1 is holding the ball.
There are four ways that a ball can leave A1's control: the ball is stripped, the ball is fumbled, the ball is shot, or the ball is passed.
[4-43-3 and 4-43-4 explain how you can legally, intentionally release the ball: try, dribble, or pass.]
So, if A1 is tossing the ball from hand to hand, he is PASSING. While the ball is in the air, he does NOT have PLAYER CONTROL; but, his team retains Team Control.
COMMENT:
Player Control does NOT exist while the ball is in the air untouched, nor while the ball is on the FLOOR untouched [unless it is in the air OR on the floor during a dribble]
In other words; I kicked the part about PLAYER CONTROL [in my previous posts], but, in my defense, clearly a PASS is poorly or incompletely defined.
Comments or Criticisms are welcome!!!
[Edited by Slider on Feb 1st, 2002 at 05:57 PM]