Know the rules!!!

[Jurassic Referee]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

The designated spot is three feet wide. If a player must keep one foot over the designated spot, and if that player has a very long stride, doesn't that designated spot really become about nine feet wide?

No.

The designated spot is 3' wide. Period.

[BillyMac]

From Billy Mac: The designated spot is three feet wide. If a player keeps one foot over the designated spot, and if that player has a very long stride, that designated spot can become about nine feet wide

From Jurassic Referee: No. The designated spot is 3' wide. Period.

From: NFHS Rule 4-42-6-Note: The player in-bounding the ball must keep one foot on or over the 3' wide designated spot until the ball is released.

Jurassic Referee: Do you have any rule book or case book citations to back up your statement?

Forum members: Three-feet wide, no allowance for a normal stride by the inbounder as he or she throws a pass inbounds, or do you allow the player a normal stride that might be more than eighteen-inches from the center of the designated spot? What interpretation do you use in your local board or chapter?

[Jurassic Referee]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

Do you have any rule book or case book citations to back up your statement? I know the rule book says three-feet wide, period, and no more. If possible, I would like some more information regarding your interpretation before I question my interpreter.

Yup, NFHS rule 4-42-6--"The designated spot is 3 feet wide with no depth limitation."

All your rules interpreter is doing imo is confusing everybody with his 9' verbiage on a rule that is fairly clear. It's much easier if he just uses what's already in the rule book when he teaches officials what to look for. The designated spot is 3 feet wide. When you give the ball to the thrower, you assume that he's in the center of the 3' designated spot. The thrower now violates if he leaves the designated spot(R7-6-2 & 9-2-1). If the thrower does have one foot on or over either side of the 3' foot spot before releasing the throw-in, he's OK(CB7.6.2). The usual way to teach it is just to say "let the thrower take a full step to either side with his outside leg, bring his back leg to his outside leg, and then just watch the back leg to make sure that leg doesn't get moved any wider". That will keep a foot of the thrower within the designated spot.It's a judgment call anyway. If it's close, I always judge it in favor of the thrower, using the principle that if you're not sure it's a violation, then it isn't a violation.

Again, jmo Billie, but I think if your interpreter gets into trying to explain 9' wide designated spots, all he's doing is confusing new officials. They'll never find anything resembling that in the rule or case book that will match what they're being told.

[BillyMac]

Jurassic Referee: Please note my 8:31 p.m. edit to this thread after I your response got me to get my lazy butt out of this chair to get my rule book downstairs in my bag. I wouldn't do this for many posters on this Forum, but when you start citing rules, as the old Merrill Lynch commercial stated, "People listen".

Fact:The designated spot is 3 feet wide with no depth limitation.

Fact: NFHS Rule 4-42-6-Note: The player in-bounding the ball must keep one foot on or over the 3' wide designated spot until the ball is released.

Fact: A player may not travel while out of bounds.

If a player legally moves to the far right side of the three-foot wide designated spot, keeps one foot over that three-foot wide designated spot, and takes a normal two foot stride before releasing the ball (from my high school coach, "step into your pass"), his or her designated spot has now become five feet wide. The inbounder can choose to do the same thing on the left side of the designated spot (within five seconds), now making the designated spot seven feet wide. Now think about the tallest player that you've ever seen in a NFHS game, probably close to seven-feet tall. If you allow them their normal three foot (or longer) stride, we're now talking about a designated spot about nine-feet (or wider) wide.

Where is my thinking wrong?

[Jurassic Referee]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

J
If a player legally moves to the far right side of the three-foot wide designated spot, keeps one foot over that three-foot wide designated spot, and takes a normal two foot stride before releasing the ball (from my high school coach, "step into your pass"), his or her designated spot has now become five feet wide.

Yup, and the thrower committed a throw-in violation as soon as he took that "normal two foot stride before releasing the ball". That "two foot stride" will take both feet of the thrower out of the 3' wide designated spot.

You can legally move to the far right side of the spot, but you sureasheck can't legally take any "two foot strides" after you do so. You get one normal step to either side, Billy, not two.

[BillyMac]

Jurassic Referee:

I just stepped away from my computer, kept one foot on the ground, and took one step, or stride, as far as I could go without taking my back foot off the ground. It was the width of my daughter's bed, measured with a ruler, it was approximately three feet, and I'm only six feet tall, and about as flexible as a marble statue. Maybe we're not understanding each other's image of this play? I believe that if, as the rule suggests, I'm allowed to "travel" in the designated spot, that I can legally make the throwin from area nine feet wide by an unlimited number of feet back (up to five seconds), without ever moving one of my feet outside the three foot wide designated spot. Please get out your yardstick and try it.

From one of your posts in this thread, I think, hopefully, that we agree. In a real game, I believe that both of us will legally allow a player to take one normal stride outside the three foot designated spot before making a throw in, as long as he or she does not move one of his or her feet outside the three foot wide designated spot and releases the ball within five seconds.

Why has this become a two person debate? Where are the other Forum members? Where's Chuck Elias?

Jurassic Referee: Thanks for not calling me any names in this thread. I appreciate your wisdom on this Forum, especially your useful rule and case book citations, but I dislike it when you lose patience and get involved with name-calling, oft times not started by you. I appreciate your patience with me in this thread, and thanks for your apology on your misunderstanding of one of my statements regarding adminstrative technical fouls (scorebook) in another thread. I'm relatively new to this Forum, I've only posted 180 times, and can't believe that I got an apology from "THE" Jurassic Referee.

[mplagrow]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

I'm relatively new to this Forum, I've only posted 180 times, and can't believe that I got an apology from "THE" Jurassic Referee.

First one since the Mesozoic Era, if I recall correctly.

[iceman70]

BillyMac:

You got it. The designated spot, just like your daughter's bed, never becomes wider than 3'. You were confusing the actual area the player can cover with the spot itself.

[Jurassic Referee]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

Jurassic Referee:

1) From one of your posts in this thread, I think, hopefully, that we agree. In a real game, I believe that both of us will legally allow a player to take one normal stride outside the three foot designated spot before making a throw in, as long as he or she does not move one of his or her feet outside the three foot wide designated spot and releases the ball within five seconds.

2) Where's Chuck Elias?

3) Jurassic Referee: Thanks for not calling me any names in this thread.

1) That's basically what I've been saying too, Billy.

2) Chuck Elias has moved to Tampa Bay and taken a position during spring training as a towel boy at Legends Field.

3) You're welcome. Please note that there are no guarantees that this will carry over into future threads.(Actually, I'm trying to work on that. I can get too carried away sometimes- usually with some of the fanboys that slither out of the ooze at this time of the year).

[bob jenkins]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

If a player legally moves to the far right side of the three-foot wide designated spot, keeps one foot over that three-foot wide designated spot, and takes a normal two foot stride before releasing the ball (from my high school coach, "step into your pass"), his or her designated spot has now become five feet wide.

Where is my thinking wrong?

The rule *could have* been written as something like "the designated spot is 7 feet wide, but the player must keep both feet in or over the spot". this would have roughly the same effect as "the spot is 3' wide; one foot must be kept over the spot."

The point is 1) watch the "back" foot, not the "front" foot, 2) use the rule book terms / rules when talking to / teaching other officials.

[BillyMac]

I believe it is a Chinese proverb that states "One picture is worth a thousand words". I guess that Jurassic Referee and I agree on the interpretation of the rule but the "wording" of my interpretation got in the way.

Thanks to other Forum members for joining in to help other Forum members, especially fans, coaches, and rookie officials, to understand this designated spot rule.

Mplagrow states: "First one since the Mesozoic Era, if I recall correctly".

Mplagrow: If I may use my unused (I'm now an analytical chemist) B.S. and M.S. in Geology, Jurassic Referee had not yet evolved in the early part of the Mesozoic Era. I don't know who officiated games in the Triassic Period, the age of much of the bedrock here in Central Connecticut. We've got plenty of fossil footprints of this official, but don't know who the official was that created them.