Happy 150th birthday to the baseball glove, a ballplayer's most personal piece of equipment

"It's your glove, your baseball glove. It's got a soul, a memory all its own, and a future that never fades because it has never let go of the grasp the past has on you ... " — Journalist Mike Barnicle.

Ask a ballplayer about his first glove and he remembers every detail, like his first car, the first fish he caught or the first time a girl returned his shy smile.

“A Rawlings from a Kmart in Owensboro, Ky.,” said University of North Florida assistant baseball coach and former Major Leaguer Brad Wilkerson. ”Ryne Sandberg signature inside. I was 10 years old. Probably cost $15, which was a stretch for my parents back then. Kept it until the eighth grade.” 

“Wilson 2K, red and black,” said Jacksonville University pitcher Richard Long about his first glove. ”The team I was on when I was 10 had red and black colors so I thought it was the coolest thing ever.” 

“Rawlings, 11-inch, Velcro across the wrist,” UNF pitcher Clayton Boroski said. 

"Mizuno, from Sports Unlimited on the Southside,” said former Englewood and Jacksonville University player and Major Leaguer Daniel Murphy. ”I was 9 years old. It didn’t need a lot of breaking in. I was ready to rock with that glove.” 

The romance with a first glove extends to softball. Listen to UNF catcher Mackenzie Woods: 

“Black Mizuno catcher’s glove,” she said of her first glove. ”I was 10 years old. I kept bugging my coach to let me catch and my parents said if you’re going to catch you need the right glove. Let’s go get one.” 

The first one is always the right one, isn’t it?

Players and their hands get bigger and outgrow the first glove and there is always one to take its place, loved in equal measure.

“There’s a romance between ballplayers and their gloves,” said Jacksonville Jaguars radio announcer Frank Frangie, a former San Soucie Little League and Englewood High pitcher whose first glove was a Rawlings from the Montgomery Ward in Philips Square Mall on U.S. 1 in 1966, for $2.95. 

”I remember being upset because by the time we got home, it was too dark to play catch and I had to wait until the next day,” Frangie recalls of that day when he was 8 years old. “It’s hard to explain the magic in that first glove and any glove you have after that to someone who doesn’t understand baseball” 

Happy birthday to the baseball glove 

According to historical accounts, the baseball glove is 150 years old, dating back to an obscure player for the St. Louis Brown Stockings in 1875 named Charlie Waitt. There is evidence a player named Doug Allison, a catcher for the Cincinnati Reds, used a glove in 1870 because of an injured hand but Waitt has been credited by historians for being the first to use a glove in every game.

Waitt heard it from opposing players and fans who questioned his manhood for not going bare-handed. He actually used two gloves and found flesh-colored ones in hopes no one would see them from a distance.

Episcopal pitcher Dominic DeLoreto gets the sign from his catcher during a Region 1-2A baseball playoff game against Providence. DeLoreto has his glover personalized and with the strings holding it together of a different color than the body of the glove.

But more players became convinced a glove would be helpful, even at a time when hitters likely weren’t posting velocity rates of 100 mph. 

Within 10 years, Rawlings submitted the first patent for a baseball glove. The catcher’s mitt was invented by Albert Spalding in 1880 and he later parlayed that into his sporting goods empire. 

And the romance began.

Gloves are a personal piece of equipment 

The obvious answer to the relationship between ballplayers and their gloves is it's the piece of baseball equipment that is attached to them the most.  

Once in hand, balls are to be pitched or thrown to a base, with the result happening after it’s left a player’s hand.  

Bats are used to hit the baseball, then dropped immediately to run the bases.  

Catcher’s equipment is a necessary evil, cumbersome and heavy.

Baseball gloves, such as these hanging in the dugout of the St. Johns Country Day Spartans, have become more colorful and can be ordered in almost any hue or design.

But a glove ... it’s worn, not used and thrown away or dropped. And the more it's worn the more it becomes broken in and the more it becomes broken in, the better it feels. 

“It’s the implement you touch the most and practice with the most,” Murphy said of gloves. “You get your four or five turns at bat. The pitcher and catcher handle the ball more than anyone. But your glove is on your hand for 27 outs.” 

The process after the purchase of a new glove is not unlike caring for a small child: the rubbing of oil in the pocket, wrapping a glove gently with a belt or rope with a ball in the webbing to help break it in, placing the glove under a mattress.

And that smell. From tee ball to the Majors, what ballplayer hasn’t held a glove to their face at odd moments and inhaled the leather aroma, mixed with whatever substance was used to help soften the pocket? 

For aromas that define baseball, the smell of a glove is right up there with popcorn and freshly cut grass.

“It’s an extension of your body,” said JU coach Chris Hayes. ”When it fits right it feels right and it gives you great comfort and confidence. 

And the glove permeates baseball lore and legend.

The batting leader in the American and National League may get the "Silver Slugger" award but the best defensive player at each position earns the "Golden Glove."

Annie Savoy, the female lead in Bull Durham, had her standards in choosing companions from the Bulls each season: She wouldn't consort with a player hitting less than .250, "unless he was a great glove man up the middle."

Legendary columnist Jim Murray, writing about another legend, said Willie Mays' glove "was where triples went to die."

And face it: no matter how many runs a team scores, it can't win a game unless it gets 27 outs. And that depends on what they do with their gloves as much as their bats.

"It's a magical thing, the mitt," Sports Illustrated's Steve Wulf wrote in 1990. "Hundreds of thousands are made every year, yet each one is special to the hand it winds up marrying."

Wulf further wrote one immutable truth: "You can't spell glove without l-o-v-e."

The original good field, no hit player 

Charles C. Waitt, born in Hallowell, Maine eight years before the Civil War began, couldn’t hit to save his life. 

During a Major League career that covered nine years with four teams, Waitt had a career batting average of .165 and an on-base percentage of .197. Oddly enough, he had only 11 strikeouts in 406 at-bats so he was making contact. 

The balls evidently weren’t going very far. 

Waitt, however, made a lasting contribution to baseball, when he began wearing a glove (sometimes two) during the 1875 season.

Spalding, who played for the Chicago White Sox, followed suit in using a glove and because he pitched and hit (252-65 record on the mound and a lifetime batting average of .313) and was among the game’s stars, hardly anyone dared criticize him.

Rather, players began emulating him.  

Spalding saw the future of adding another piece of equipment to what was fast becoming the national game and built his sporting goods empire in part on manufacturing and development of gloves. 

Webs or pockets were added to gloves in the early 1900s. St. Louis Cardinals pitcher Bill Doak designed a glove with the web between the thumb and first finger. He patented the design, sold it to Rawlings and they both made a killing. 

The leading glove manufacturers, which had been dominated by Rawlings (the official glove of Major League Baseball), Spalding and Wilson, now include Mizuno and Marucci, among others. 

A glove belonging to a member of the St. Johns Country Day Spartans hangs on a dugout railing on April 28, 2025.

Gloves for T-ball-aged players can be as inexpensive as $15. Most retail stores have a good supply of gloves under $100 but custom gloves made of leather can be as high as $400. 

According to the website verifiedmarketresearch.com, baseball glove sales were $5.3 billion in 2024 and are projected to increase to $6.9 billion by 2031. That’s a third of the sales of all baseball equipment, which includes balls, bats, batting helmets and other items such as batting and sliding gloves, practice clothing and bat bags. 

Can gloves get any better? 

Over the years gloves have improved in material and design and in recent years, can be ordered and made in almost any color or combination of colors matching a team’s uniform colors or simply a player’s personal preference. 

Synthetic materials are being used but ballplayers will swear there’s nothing like the feel of leather. 

At a certain point, when the modern glove had been fully developed, its performance-enhancing capabilities peaked. The two area residents interviewed who played in the Majors, Wilkerson and Murphy, said as good as gloves are, it's still up to the player to have the skills to be good on defense.

“You either have soft hands and good feet or you don’t," Wilkerson said. "You take a guy like Ozzie Smith ... he could catch the ball with a ping-pong paddle. Plus, Major Leaguers and even kids today are playing on turf that’s so pure you don’t get a lot of bad hops.” 

Murphy ventured the notion that modern gloves with deeper pockets for outfielders can actually be a detriment at times. 

“You may have to take another step to be able to get the ball out of the pocket and into your hand to throw it and prevent runners from advancing on the bases,” he said. “It’s part of the price we pay for having the deeper pocket. Sometimes the ball would get lost in there.” 

Long-term love affairs with gloves

A new glove is available every season when players get to the college level. Players could almost open their own sporting goods store at the Major League level. 

“I’ve got at least six gloves at home that I’ve never taken out of the wrapper,” said Wilkerson. “I’d use one glove a year and another one I’d use during batting practice, to get it in shape for the next year.” 

A rack of gloves on display at the Dick's Sporting Goods store at the Jacksonville Town Center.

Murphy said spring training is like Christmas for Major League players. 

“The guys from Wilson and Rawlings come through and you can get pretty much anything you want,” he said. 

Not every player jumps at the chance for a new glove every year. 

JU Dolphins' senior outfielder Blake DeLamielleure has used the same glove since he was a sophomore. He said when his college career is over at the end of this season, the glove will go on display somewhere in his home office. 

But for long-lasting love of their gloves, there are JU shortstop Sammy Mummau and UNF softball catcher Mackenzie Woods. 

Mummau said he’s been using the same glove since his freshman year in high school — seven years and counting. Woods has had her catcher’s mitt for three years, which is a long time for a catcher given how often they handle the ball. 

“I’ll use this until it breaks,” Mummau said.

Woods was of like mind. 

“I refuse to let go of this glove until I physically cannot catch the ball. It’s like a pancake, the padding is worn out but I trust it.” 

Many ballplayers are also jealous lovers when it comes to their gloves. They can’t stand someone touching it and a player actually putting his or her hand in someone else's glove has caused dugout arguments and even fights for eons. 

“I’m not that type of guy but I’ve known other guys who will fight you if you try to wear their glove,” DeLamielleure said. 

“They can touch it to bring it to me on the field if the inning ends and I’m on base,” Mummau said of a common courtesy ballplayers extend to each other. “But that’s it.” 

Baseball gloves can be purchased to fit the hands of 5-year-olds playing Tee Ball.

“I cannot stand it when someone puts their hands on my glove,” Woods said. “I love how mine is broken in. If someone else puts their hand in it, I freak out. They might change how it feels.” 

Wilkerson said former teammate Adrian Beltre was fiercely protective of his glove. 

“No one could touch it,” he said. “He’d get so mad he’d slap guys if they tried to touch his glove.” 

The glorious game of catch 

Gloves also are ingrained within the soul of baseball because if there aren’t enough kids or enough space to actually play a game (even with ghost runners), there’s always room to play catch. 

And it only takes two. 

What father-son moment in any sport is as timeless as the two playing catch? According to a poll of ESPN Page 2 readers on the best baseball movie moments of all time, the scene in “Field of Dreams” where Kevin Costner’s character is playing catch with his father, who has come to life as a young man in the cornfield, tops the list. 

The ritual has no rules, no boundaries and not even much conversation.

All Costner's character Ray Kinsella said, with a half-sob lingering on the final word was: "Dad ... you wanna have a catch?"

After his father said, "I'd like that," no more words were spoken for the rest of the movie.

"Baseball is continuous, like nothing else among American things," Hall wrote. "An endless game of repeated summers, joining the long generations of all the fathers and all the sons."

It's perhaps with this kind of romance in mind that Walkoff Charities, launched by Frangie to bring baseball to children in underserved communities, gives every child who comes to its clinics or signs up with one of its affiliate leagues a new glove — nearly 3,000 per year.

"When I got my first glove, I can't tell you how many times I went to bed with it," Frangie said. "I want kids to have that feeling about their first glove. The best part is when our kids get their gloves, the first thing our coaches do is tell them to write their names on the glove. It's that moment when it hits them: 'This is my glove.'"

And when the ball smacks into that first glove, creating that satisfying pop, the romance is renewed again — as it has for 150 years.

This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Happy 150th birthday to the baseball glove, a ballplayer's most personal piece of equipment