ball caught by offensive player

[DaveASA/FED]

Ok let me bark up this tree.....8.8.M says they intentionally interfere with the ball to get an out. Well do we have INT in this play? I can't judge that from the OP it is a HTBT, where was F5 and F6 playing? Would they have had a shot at the ball if R1 didn't catch it? I am assumming a little bit here (and we all know what that does ) BUT lets say that F5 and F6 are not in position to have gotten a glove on that hot shot, it would have sailed into left field and been eventually retrieved by that left fielder sometime....so by stopping the ball and dropping in by 3rd base instead of it rocketing into left I am thinking that the runner helped the defense not interfered with them. Again that is looking WAY too into the play as listed in the OP, but I would use that judgement in determining if there was INT or not. If a defensive player had a play on the ball then there is INT, but if not then no INT play on. Also it makes me wonder where the ball was in relationship to foul/fair. That could also be interesting...in this case if they are standing on 3rd (as OP said) then there is a chance that the ball would have been a foul ball if it continued its normal flight (not caught by R1) and could have easily landed foul after passing 3rd in the air. So there is another judgement to make, I also think if IY(your)J the ball would have been foul if untouched you have another senario where you could get INT easily.

JMO, what do you all think??