Way to intentionally ground legally?

[NJOfficial]

I think this is an interesting potential loophole in the intentional grounding rule, namely 9-5-2d, which states that "a pass intentionally thrown into an area not occupied by an eligible offensive receiver" is illegal. The argument seems valid that the pass is in fact being thrown to an eligible offensive receiver, namely the QB himself.

However, I think that, despite having an eligible receiver "in the area," we should consider this to be a pass "intentionally thrown incomplete to save loss of yardage," which should be ruled as intentional grounding.