Rule 9-3-3 California ruling, what is your association doing?
 

The following question was sent to John Lozano, CBOA Instructional
Coordinator, regarding the following play:

Rule 9-3-3

Situation: Player A1 in the front court dribbles down the left
sideline and as he gets to the baselinehe goes airborne (a) over in bounds
territory and makes a pass to player A2 in the far right corner, (b)over
out of bounds territory and makes a pass to player A2 in thr far right
corner. In both cases A1 lands out of boumds.

Question Does it matter if A1 is very skillful and has devolped a play
(team practice play) where A1 jumps over out of bounds territory (on
purpose) where he can't be well guarded and passes the ball after which
A1 lands out of bounds

Ruling Rule 9-3-3 does not apply in this case since Player A1 has
the ball. This rule is not intended to penalize momentum

Is anybody anywhere saying that Rule 9-3-3 applies here? Can't imagine...

Haven't discussed it with the association, but if all he does is land and immediately return to the court, no way is that a violation.

Why oh why is NFHS R9-S3-A3 so difficult to understand. It is meant to penalize a player who deliberately leaves the court to gain and advantage not allowed by the rules. A player's momentum from making a legal play taking him out of bounds is NOT an infraction of this rule.

MTD, Sr.

Perhaps because some of us feel that by allowing the offense to deliberately leave the court in order to use the out of bounds area to make plays in gives them an advantage that we don't feel was intended by the rules. Not after all the freaking noise the NFHS made in recent years about playing the game inside the court. Not after their rationalizing about the defense gaining an advantage merely by having a foot on the boundary line. If the offense can't step out of bounds to go around a screen, why on earth should they be allowed to jump out of bounds to make a pass? This isn't saving a ball; it's a set play. It's inconsistent. And it's stupid.

That answer your question? :cool:

1. To those who think this is a violation because the offense is gaining an illegal advantage: What prevents the defense/defender from jumping from the playing court, over out of bounds to defend the pass?

2. How is this, in application, any different from an A player underneath one block, pinned to the endline, delivering a wraparound pass to a teammate underneath the other block, with the pass being released, traveling in the air, and caught, outside the vertical plane of the endline?

You are where you were till you get where you're going. These plays mean the players are still inbounds until they land. Not inconsistent at all.

While I don't consider this a violation, I do see where the point is coming from. The player is in full control and is making a choice to jump OOB. That player is not going where the ball takes them (chasing down a lose ball, rebound, etc.) but is choosing to jump OOB with no other reason than to get an advantage just before landing OOB. Again, I don't consider it a violation, but I can understand the argument.

I concur, Camron. It was a good question that has since been answered by the NFHS in this year's inteps. (Did anyone bother to look there? ;) )

SITUATION 5: A1, while being defended, is driving from near the free-throw line extended toward the end line. A1 continues toward the end line and pulls up and goes airborne just before the boundary line with his/her momentum carrying him/her out of bounds. Just as A1 goes airborne, he/she passes off to a teammate across the lane and lands out of bounds. RULING: No violation. A player's momentum, after performing legal actions on the court that results in taking him/her out of bounds is not a violation for leaving the floor for an unauthorized reason. However, if A1 purposely or deceitfully delays returning after legally being out of bounds to gain an advantage, a player technical foul would be assessed. (4-4-3; 9-3-3; 10-3-3)

Sooooo........whatintheheck <b>is</b> the difference then between this play and saving a ball?:confused: In both, according to you, there is a player deliberately leaving the court in order to use the OOB area to make a play that gives them an advantage. What I fail to see though in both cases is a player that actually <b>is</b> OOB making a play. Maybe you can point out to me where that is happening.

And how can you possibly say that it's an advantage <b>not</b> intended by the rules when the <b>rules</b> very <b>specifically</b> say that it's <b>legal</b>? It's even posted above now....Situation #5.

There's one heckuva big difference between making a play while you are already OOB, <i>a la</i> the highlighted references of your above, and making a play while you are still <b>in-bounds</b> (which an airborne player jumping from in-bounds sureasheck is). The FED has been consistent as you could possibly get. They've been telling us that they want the game to be played in-bounds. The play that you're talking about is happening in-bounds. The FED has already set restrictions as to what happens when players go OOB. Those restrictions include a penalty of violations or technical fouls.

There is a big difference between in-bounds and out-of-bounds.

MTD asked a question; I answered it. Obviously the Fed disagrees with me. I can live with that. And I'll continue to call it their way. But that doesn't make me like it. ;)

I'm not disagreeing here. Obviously the Fed says this is legal, so no problem with the play.

The difference, however, is the intentionality of it. In saving the ball, the player hasn't intentionally determined anything - the ball determines that he must go OOB. In the situation described, the player intentionally jumps OOB to make a play.

Both are legal, but there is a reason someone could argue one should be legal and one illegal.

My solution...
 

I think we should take all ambiguity out of it and go back to the era which brought us the term cagers.

I'm thinking we could update to plexiglass instead of chicken wire.

:D

eyezen:

I doubt you are old enough to remember caged basketball games, but I hope you are part of a new generation of rules historians to replace old geezers like me and distinquised gentlemen like JR. :D

MTD, Sr.

I still have marks on my arms from jumping up against the cages. Of course, that was when I lived in the monkey house at the zoo. They finally let me out when they determined I was a danger to the monkeys. :p

I've got to get back on my meds. :o

Shoulda taken that President of the United States job, even with the pay cut.
Nicer place to live, and interns at your beck and call, so to speak.

Folks, these players AREN'T out of bounds. They aren't jumping out of bounds to gain an advantage, they are jumping to a legal place (above oob) to gain a specifically allowed advantage. What about a player who sails oob after making a lay-up? Did he jump oob to gain an illegal advantage? No. how is this any different?

Really? They aren't jumping out of bounds to gain an advantage? They why are they jumping out of bounds? Why not stay on the court and make the pass? ;)

They ARE still inbounds when they make the pass. They aren't oob until they land. It's all legal, BITSy. All legal. Not just because someone wrote an exception, but because they aren't breaking any rules.

That part doesn't matter. What does is whether they left the court for an unauthorized reason.

Obviously the Fed doesn't want us to call it that way, and that's fine. I don't want to call it that way, so I'm actually happy.

But there is a rational argument to be made for why they should change that interpretation.

"Momentum" isn't an unauthorized reason. That's the same as it's always been. Why change the interp?

Cagers
 

The court was also ringed by something new to basketball — a 12-foot, chain-link "cage" separating players from fans.

"The Trentons had conceived the idea that a cage would make the game faster by stopping all out-of-bounds delays," wrote Marvin Riley, the referee at that historic game. "That cage was an object of both interest and sarcasm for a long time. It was called 'Trenton's monkey cage.'"

By the 1920s, the cage had been phased out of the game. Still, headline writers fell in love with the word as a synonym for basketball, and players are sometimes still called "cagers."

I believe a rational arguement could be made that when a player deliberately jumps OOB with control of the ball that it is not momentum.

I suppose it could, if the rule included the word "intentional" or "deliberate". But it doesn't. Using momentum doesn't seem to be against the rules. Momentim is a specific physical factor that doesn't have any moral judgment. whether a player "momentum"s on purpose or just gets "mometumed" by accident doesn't change the nature of the physics. And the rule book doesn't distinguish between those.

It's simple. You're inbounds until you land out of bounds. As long as you are inbounds you can do whatever you like. You can pass off and land in the balcony. If this rule was changed as some are suggesting, it would open a huge can of "he coulda stayed inbounds" worms.

So, what about when a player causes his "momentum" to take him OOB around a screen?

And am I doing a good job playing devil's advocate? :D

Not really.:D

In your what if, the play would be legal if she could get around the screen without touching the floor oob, ie, staying in the air. What are the chances?

Well, sure, but that would have nothing to do with the original play. In the original play, the problem has nothing to do with the ball and when/where it is passed. It has to do with the player ending up OOB. Why should it be any different if a player ends up OOB getting around a screen as throwing a pass around a defender?

Yes it does. The "problem" has to do with people mis-interpreting that the player is passing the ball from oob, when in fact that play happens from inbound space that is above the oob space.

Because the problem isn't that the player "ends up oob" to get around a screen. It's that the player is oob in the middle of the play and ends up inbounds again. That's the problem. Which is different from the OP where the player isn't "using" oob space to gain an advantage.

No, you're deliberately ignoring the point that in order to make that play the player will leave the court. And there is no "inbounds space" above the oob. That is complete nonsense.

Wrong again. The problem is that the player leaves the court at all. The fact that he/she came back inbounds later isn't the basis for the violation, nor does it have anything to do with "the middle of the play". It's the act of leaving the court that is a violation.

As has been pointed out ad nauseum, the play is legal. The NFHS has said it's legal. Individual interpreters have called it legal. Fair enough; that's how I will continue to referee this play. But to insist that how the Fed ruled is the only possible, logical, or reasonable way the situation can be viewed is quite simply baloney. :rolleyes:

The only way to interpret it as illegal would be to change the definition of oob to being the plane above the line. Slippery slope, imo.

Not at all true. BITS and I are obviously not communicating this very well.

Where the player is when he throws the pass is of absolutely no consequence. He has inbound status when he throws the pass. There is no violation there at all, nor any arguement there should be.

Where the violation would occur is when the player who passed the ball lands OOB. The arguement would be that this is leaving the court for unauthorized reasons and a violation. Regardless of where the passed ball is/was/will be.

I think you're communicating it fine. It's just that nobody else thinks it's an issue to be concerned about. This whole thread gets a big "YAWN" out of me, personally.

:eek:

I'd quit reading then, if I were you...;)

But they specifically say that this is NOT leaving the court for unauthorized reasons. Nowhere does it say that the momentum has to be without intentionality.

What if it's not momentum, but gravity? :D

Don't worry, rainmaker, I happen to agree with you on this, but do see the validity of the pondering the question, particularly when the NFHS came out with such a strong POE a couple of years ago insisting that the players play the game from "within the confines of the playing court." The NFHS could just as easily have said that this player is gaining an unfair advantage from jumping past the boundary plane and deemed the action to be a violation. I think that ruling would have been problematic at best and am glad that they didn't go that way.

Whew!! I was worried about that! Spent all last night tossing and turning, wondering why you hadn't checked in yet... [toggle sarcasm off]

Well you might toss and turn tonight then, KNOWING that I do agree with your position. :eek:

Do you wish to reconsider? :)

LOL!!

I understand what here, and here are my two techincal cents:
BITS - Technically, there's no "out-of-bounds space" above OB either. For all intents and purposes, a player, by rule, is not out of bounds until he/she touches something that is out of bounds (which does not include the air out of bounds).
JUULIE - The rule does actually say "leave the floor for an unauthorized reason," as opposed to using the words "in bounds," so I see the counterpoint, too.

But I still think if this was the way the rules-makers intended the game to be played, all boundary lines would be vertical planes at all times (i.e. plexiglass cage), and not lines on the floor.

To take it one step further, then, is it a violation or a technical foul for a player jumping high off the ground (leaving the floor) in reaction to an official's call/no-call during a live ball?;)

LOL on the last sentence.

As for the other parts - jumping off the floor doesn't even have anything to do with BITS' arguement. The only thing that matters is that the player intentionally ends up OOB. Some would say that is leaving the floor for an unauthorized reason.

...Why does the penalty state "violation or technical foul"? when would this be a technical foul? I read this in the rule book under penalty during throw-in...

Thanks

It is a violation to </b>leave</b> the court for an <b>unauthorized</b> reason. Rule 9-3-3.

It is a technical foul to delay returning in-bounds after being <b>legally</b> out-of-bounds. Rule 10-3-3.

Different penalties for different actions.

Dem's the general rules to follow. You have to learn the nuances of how to apply each rule.