Okay, I know it's a matter of reading and managing an audience, but sometimes...well, Murphy's Law is inevitable.

At tonight's Strolling gig, I was doing a simple sponge ball routine, and like many such routines a ball is secretly loaded into the spec's hand. After instructing said spec to "hold this tightly..." I started to vanish a "second" ball. She beat me to the punch, however, opening her hand first. "Oh, cool, look at that...two balls! Hey, I'll bet you didn't expect me to do THAT, did you?"

No, but I'll be ready for you next time
Leland

Howdy Leland.Please excuse me if I am telling you something you are already aware of.

After you place the double in the helper's hand,gently turn their hand over so it is 'closed but palm down'...this will 'greatly' decrease the urge for them to prematurely open their hand.

Rich

My friend and mentor Charlie Dodson -- father of Trixie Bond -- used to prevent this in almost exactly the way Rich has described. He took it one step further, though. He would place the ball into the spectator's hand, have her turn it over, and he would place his middle and ring finger on the back of her fingers, and his thumb on the first joint of one of her fingers. Then he would give them a little squeeze -- not hard, but enough to give the impression that it would be best if she did not open her hand.

Once you have done this, keep an eye on that hand. If they begin to turn it over, you can grab it and turn it back.

You can also say, "Keep your fingers closed. Don't let anything get into or out of your hand."

If this happens it's a great moment to practice getting a good laugh out of a mishap.
You're laughing at the situation and at your own expense.

However, in an attempt to avoid mishaps at all cost...
I have them turn their hand over and hold their arm out straight. This does the job.

If I have a table, I will sometimes rest my wand on the back of their fist.

Goshman would lay his closed fist palm side up on the back of the spectators palm down closed fist. Of course spectator has to be seated at a table.

Absolutely Bill!I alway's say that.It works like a charm.Psychologically they don't want to screw up...kids or adults.

Rich

That's bound to happen from time to time no matter what you do. I turn it into an effect by itself and say something like "WOW...you made the ball vanish before I can even open my hand. You are Magic...give them a nice round of applause please!"

So that way it seems as if you planned it that way.

Bummer, brother. Although I don't have a set Sponge ball routine I do use 3d Bunnies allot and I try to emphasize that point. I try my best to make them focus on whats in my hand then theres, almost as if I want them to forget what they have in there hand. Sometimes when I place it in there hand ill turn thier hand around and place my open hand on top of theres and do the vanish that way. This way it takes more effort for them to try and surprise me by opening there hand prematurely. Hope I helped a bit.

Thanks for the help, Magi -- good stuff, as usual. [Paisa, hang in there with the no smoking!] May I return the favour by sharing my intro?

I do a ball roll with a 37mm silicone bounce ball from the party store, a nice little attention getter as I approach. I "introduce" the ball as "Bob," my new assistant who'd like to do a few tricks; he then gets "put away" in my pocket twice, reappearing each time. On the second 'reappearance' I'm loading a sponge ball in the hand going to pocket. Specs are asked whether they've ever seen Bob on TV...maybe they'd recognise him if he put on his costume. On the third reappearance this sponge ball gets switched in. "Now do you know him? It's....SPONGE Bob!"

C'mon, my kid forces me to watch that hideous creature on Nick!

I have a newphew who is 13 years old now, but when he was a tad younger he went through the Sponge Bob phase. I used to refer to the character as Square Bob Sponge Pants. This made him laugh.

A couple of other ploys...

"I'm going to try to magically remove the ball from your closed fist..." Especially with kids, they'll squeeze tighter.

An adapted Juan Tamariz line: "Hold the ball tightly. In fact--I am CRAZY today!--hold you OTHER hand around your fist!"

Me doing the rabbits:

"Turn your hand over. Hold on tight. Don't let go, otherwise we'll have to take the hamster for lunch"

When I'm putting the sponge ball in thier hand I say "Hold on tight don't let me take this out of your hand."and it usually works well.

It seems that whenever we challenge the audience that we are going to take away the sponge ball from their hands, they would grip the balls even tighter.

Sponge Bunnies:

"Squeeze em tight, we don't want them to hop away"!