To Break In Their Gloves, Yankees Dunk, Tenderize and Lather Up

A-Rod, A-Rod, A-Rod. I'm a Yankee fan and have been for 6 decades. At least 85% of any Yankee coverage is A-Rod. I, and I'm pretty sure 95% of Yankee fans, could care less about hearing anything about or from A-Rod and all you writers understand the game so poorly all you can do is play what you think is the trump card. Weak! Why even mention him!

Why share my thoughts when you don't share them with anyone else?

As I said in an earlier, unshared comment, there is no such thing as a catchers glove or a first baseman's glove. They are mitts.

Based on the Yankees present pitching staff, those fielders are sure going to need some mighty supple gloves.

I stuck my glove wedged behind the pipe to the next floor radiator with a ball in it for the winter. Best infielder's glove I ever had

This brings back great memories of childhood when attempting to break in my mitt, I'd sleep with my lightly oiled Vada Pinson model glove tied with a ball under the mattress.

My mom and dad bought it with S&H green stamps! Frankly, it felt more like plastic than leather.

Despite my best effort, each and every ball that neared me either went right between my legs, popped out of the mitt, or was misjudged as it flew beyond my flailing reach. My dreams of a graceful catch were never realized.

I once went "0 for a season '" with about 75% strikeouts but I still loved the game and all that went with it. My manger actually cheated and kept me out of entire games…

I was with certainty the worst player in history of Little League baseball, I had great friends and teammates so that didn't matter.

But still, I slept each night with that lump under the mattress always hoping for a better day on the ball field.

This article brings back many great memories for me, and for that thank you.

I believe first basemen and catchers wear mitts, not gloves. With a glove, the fingers come into play. A mitt, like a mitten, encases the entire hand, and although there's a place to put one's fingers, they don't get used. Maybe that technical distinction has been lost.

Cover it with shaving cream.
Then shave it.

just fyi, I'm a boomer and haven't played in a game in years. when pitchers and catchers reported, I dutifully took my glove out of my closet, rubbed neatsfoot oil in the pocket, put a ball in the pocket, tied the glove up, and placed it by my bed. my wife thinks I'm nutso. I guess I am. on opening day, i'll open the glove and watch the new season, flipping the ball into the pocket and tossing it up to the ceiling while i watch the games. and I can't wait.

A friend of mines Dad had a connection with the Yankees and when my mitt broke he gave it to someone in the Yankees clubhouse to fix it. I sent a note with it telling him I liked it and it came back perfect. I used shaving cream to break it in. I loved that glove. A McGregor with a T-bar web. That mitt shows up in my dreams sometimes. I gave it to a school to use and I hope it's doing well.

I so enjoy these type of articles. My favorite glove was the Wilson A 2000 glove around 1960. It was the smaller size for infield use. Recently sent it off to be refreshed so I can take it to my HOF induction (Ha!) My first glove was in the 50"s a Rawlings Stan Musial I think Good memories

They also have a ritual for tenderizing the bats. They swing and hit air. It's a season long process.

Got my best glove, a Wilson fielder's mitt, by winning a contest on the best way to drink Hires root beer (with ice cream in it, a concoction I termed a "brown cow"). It was the greatest thing that had ever happened so far in my 12 year old life. And yes, the Neat's foot oil was used to break it in and the glove always put away with the ball in the pocket and a rubber band around it.

Ah, what could be more satisfying than buying a new glove and breaking it in. Proust would have trouble describing the wonderful tactile and olfactory sensations as well as the psychological sense of well being, knowing that now you could finally catch a ball and hold onto it.

My method: rub neatsfoot oil all overthe glove. Place ball in pocket and tied it iup for a month. Then I used a method I got from a Roy Campanella TV interview: I put some paste shoe polish in the pocket. It helped hold the ball there, and it had a wonderful aroma.

The first gloves I got in the 1940s had no shape to speak of. They were as flat and as stiff as a wood board out of the new box. We had to break them in so that they would be pliable enough to close. Shaped gloves came in in the 1950s.

I like my glove on the stiff side.

Interesting that articles like these on the National Pastime draw the boomers out to comment at the near exclusion of younger fans. I observed this when the Times reported on Sy Berger's recent death. (The man who took to a new level the sale and marketing of baseball cards.)

We are an aging breed. No one will write or care about this stuff in 20 years.

To recall a line of Roy Hobbes in The Natural, "I love baseball."

I'm glad to see others here mention the idea of using oil, a ball, and string to shape a new glove. When I was a kid (I'm a boomer also) I was taught to rub neatsfoot oil in the pocket of the glove, put a ball in there, then wrap it with string and leave it for a few days. The combination of the neatsfoot oil and the new leather smelled wonderful, even if I couldn't catch worth squat.

1) Slather it in shaving cream. Inside and out 2x.
2) Get a baseball and put it in the webbing.
3) Tie a shoelace/twine around the glove, threading it through the fingers so that it's really tight around the ball.
4) More shaving cream.
5) Put it in a plastic grocery bag.
6) Stuff it under the mattress overnight.
7) Next day, play catch with it.
8) Repeat as necessary.

This interesting article would be even better if it included the two most important parts of a glove to work on -- especially for shortstops and second basemen: 1) the heel of the glove, where a bad hop or misjudged grounder often bounces off for an error. By placing a baseball at the center of the heel, forcing the padding to both sides of the ball and tying twine around the lower quarter of the glove for a few days, a separate pocket is formed which a resourceful keystone man can manipulate in a way that will hold those bad hops that hit the heel of the glove; 2) the pinky of the glove, which often fails to hold grounders far to the fielder's left which he can barely reach -- except with his pinky. By placing a baseball at the lower inside base of the glove's pinky and folding the outer left of the glove over the baseball, while keeping the fingers of the glove straight rather than bending them, and tying twine around the glove at the base of the pinky, another pocket can be formed that will snag those grounders that would otherwise bounce off the pinky of the outstretched glove for a hit. These techniques will work best for middle infielders who train their gloves with the fingers straight to improve their reach, and who close their gloves by squeezing the thumb and pinky towards each other, rather than closing four fingers as if making a fist.

For baby boomers like me the smell of a new glove is as glorious as spring grass and mimeograph ink. You could get oil and spread it in the pocket of the glove to soften it with a ball inside. Remember when going to the sporting goods store was like Christmas in the spring?

So, they never have to deflate them?

"The first day he worked at the position, Rodriguez misplaced the glove, which a clubhouse attendant found in the trainer’s room." It is a measure of how fall A-Rod has fallen that one cannot read this sentence, noting the verb "misplaced," without raising an eyebrow.