I don't think that is true. When you pick up the ball and move it, you are part of the system... and it takes work (and produces heat). No second law violation, right?
Indeed, no 2nd law violation. And this work does not have anything to do with the 2nd law. OP summary is great: they are just doing an operation and then doing it in reverse (albeit in a technically interesting way).
There is also no violation in the proposed experiment because they put energy into the system to do their "reversal"