On Shoe Laces, Out of Bounds, and Other Objects
Ralph the Ref: “This happened to me about a month ago, adult league. They do modified college rules so there is no 5-second count closely guarded, only on a held ball everything else is pretty much college. This is the situation that happened to me: Young man was taking the ball out of bounds at the end line, his shoe was untied and it was on the cusp of, it was touching the end line but then as he moved it went over to the court however, I didn’t call anything. During a time-out , a fellow official that was just watching from the sidelines was telling me like “You know that was out of bounds right? His shoes were untied and it went over to the court.” That got me thinking for a while. And there was this article on a Referee magazine where someone was falling out of bounds and they had a ponytail that touched out of bounds and they called out of bounds which made sense but I just wanted to see what your interpretation of that rule is?
Jug: “If you noticed something before it is occurring you don’t allow the players to keep the basketball to cause them to lose possession of the basketball, you blow your whistle and take the ball away fom them and let them tie their shoes. The hair is out of bounds than the player is put of bounds, any part of your body or uniform that touches the out of bounds line you are put of bounds. This rule applies to any basketball that you are participating in, could be college, could be high school, could be pros.