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I came across the following example sentence in my textbook:

ボール運びのうまさにかけては中井{なかい}選手の右に出るものはいない。

Nakai is second to none at ボール運びing.

I looked up ボール運び in my go-to dictionaries but came up with no results. For this reason, I turned to the internet and searched a bit about it, and mostly came up with resources regarding basketball. On the other hand, I also searched for athletes named 中井 with the hope to get more context, but instead of a basketball player, some soccer and baseball players showed up, so it really didn't help.

I couldn't find a proper definition of ボール運び, but judging from my research and the words ボール and 運ぶ, my guess is it means something like "ball handling", but I am struggling to pin down its exact meaning.

From the title of the following video, the meaning is obviously not dribbling but it has to be a related concept:

ボール運びが上手くなりたいならドリブルは練習するな！

Can anyone explain the exact meaning of the word, and whether it applies only (or mainly) to basketball or it can be used for any sport featuring balls?

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    If this were football (soccer), the first term that comes to mind is "ball progression"
    – muru
    Commented Aug 5 at 4:49

2 Answers 2

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This 運び is 運ぶ nominalized using the masu-stem. Verbs nominalized using the masu-stem often have unpredictable meanings, but in this case, it's just "moving (something)". ボール運び refers to techniques to move the ball to a desired position, which includes not only dribbling but also trapping, pivoting, etc. Usually "ball handling" or "ball control" should suffice.

It can be used with any sports where players move around while holding or keeping the ball, such as soccer or rugby. I don't think it's commonly used in volleyball or tennis.

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    To people familiar with basketball jargon in English, it might be a little confusing to refer to it as "carrying" because carrying is a specific rule violation that describes a type of illegal dribble. But as long as it's clear that this "carrying" just means "bringing an object somewhere" I suppose that's easy enough to understand.
    – Leebo
    Commented Aug 4 at 2:17
  • @Leebo Thanks, removed "carrying".
    – naruto
    Commented Aug 4 at 2:25
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ボール運び is a kind of vague word that I think will be better translated as "ball delivering" or "ball logistics" (though I'm not very familiar with English sports jargon).

はこ・ぶ【運ぶ】

４ 物事を予定した段取りにしたがって進める。「事をうまく—・ぶ」「会議を—・ぶ」

Depending on the context, it might refer to micro-management technique of keeping and defending the ball in your hand, or tactics of sending ball to a desired point, or how to control and possess the ball at your will in a game.

Of course, it sometimes just means carrying balls as sporting equipment.

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