Overtime Play

[kdf5]

Originally Posted by whitehat

MByron, those are good things to consider.

I am thinking that if B had enough control of the ball to deliberately get it to a teammate then I might judge that as possession. further, I tend to lean (not that you don't) on the side of letting the teams decide the outcome, especially if one call, one that seems at best to be unclear, would declare a winner. In this case, awarding a safety with so much uncertainty here would do just that. So, my second choice I guess would be to call it an illegal bat.

Awarding a safety and ending the game awarding a victory to A after they were clumsy enough to fumble the ball away in the first place seems a bit contrary to the spirit of the game and dangerously close to "over officiating" especially when there remains a legitimate question as to what actually happened. Sometimes there are situations that are unclear.

..just my thoughts...

I sure would love to see a video. I guess I'm stuck on the phrase "ball comes to rest at the 2". I don't see how you can attribute the force to the fumble if the fumble came to rest. Maybe the ball came to rest after it was bounced around, I don't know. But if you look at 8.5.1 Sit B, pushing a player into contact with the ball imparts a new force by the pusher so the definition of muff seems to be pretty much all inclusive except for forced touchings and bats. I would go with muff based partly on 8.5.1.B, but, after re-reading it sounds more like B flipped the ball using the back of his hand. That sounds like a bat. Whatever happened, it sounds like an intentional act.