A pilot who believes he can land his plane using the landing system as a guide [and] says something like “I have the ball” would be shamed out of the ready room for that.
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I assume it’s more accurate/correct for the pilot to refer to him/herself in the third person by saying “LittleLinda has the ball?”
The goal of every Naval Aviator anyway is to sound cool on the radio especially when stressed. It just is. Therefore extraneous words are omitted when possible. The response to ‘call the ball; assuming you can see it is ‘roger ball’ or better ‘rog ball’.