What would you do?

[Hawks Coach]

Kelvin,
I see what you are saying to a degree. But I do not find your live ball violations (travelling, palming, etc.) to be the same as establishing control of the ball OOB to bring it back in after a made basket. The ball is not live in the latter circumstance. It is also quite different to have a player under control of the ball OOB that inbounds to someone who then makes the error of stepping out. The violation that Walter called was for having made a legal throw in and then stepping on the court and touching the ball first. To be a legal throw, we need to have ball at disposal and the ball must be released on a pass directly to the court.

It is clear that if you throw the ball to a player on a designated spot throw in and they do not secure control, that the ball is not at disposal (regardless of whether or not you think they could have gained control). If the ball in this circumstance were to bounce onto the court, you would not have a throw-in. The inbounder could go get the ball without violating, and they should return it to you and you could reinitiate the throw in. Now the question here is whether it was at disposal because the first player to touch it established enough control for you to consider it at disposal. I think it is not, others believe it is. I have no issue with the ball being at disposal as soon as one player establishes control OOB and subsequently fumbling it, or if you start a count before the ball is OOB because a team does not attempt to get the ball in position to throw it in.

The next question should be whether a fumble constitutes a pass. I think it does not, others must believe that it does in order to determine that the throw-in violation occurred. Certainly the rules allow the referee to judge whether or not a fumble occurs in many other circumstances, so I do not think you are granting a "do over." I think that the call can legitmately be that the ball was not at disposal and the inbounds play has not yet occurred. You cannot do over something that has not happened.

As for starting the count on the first errant tap that rolls away from the court, I personally do not think this is prudent. Yes, a coach could use this as a delaying tactic to set up for the press break. But you would see this more than once and could then determine that you need to begin a count on subsequent errant taps. (A word of warning to the team might be in order too.) One errant tap on a loose ball (and a dead ball) should not be cause to start a 5 second count or to call a violation.