Methinks there must be some analogy to the stabilization of a frisbee against wobbles if they don't become to severe: but since the initial wobble comes from something outside of the "airstream-frisbee" system, to coin a phrase -- (your throwing arm) -- the analogy is not exact.
Would this mean that given a sufficiently deformable smaller body, you could get chaotic motion over time, pumped by the tidal forces (think the famous resonance in that collapsing bridge...)?
Thanks for explaining.
Cheers!