Glove conditioner or no?

I bought my DD a new Under Armour catcher mitt for her birthday. The store gave me a tube of Nokona glove conditioner. The instructions from UA say no oil or conditioner recommended.

Nokona makes great gloves and recommends conditioner. All-star (makes the UA) says no conditioner.

I'm using a glove mallet and we're playing catch. I'm not looking for any shortcuts,just wondering if there is a benefit to using some conditioner.

Yes there is. However, you shouldn't use more than a very light coating every 3 weeks or so. Put the glove in the dryer with 2 towels. Pour a 1/4 cup of water on one of the towels. Run the dryer on Medium for 5 minutes but no more than that. Apply the glove conditioner in a thin coat over the entire glove. Then beat the heck out of it with the glove mallet. Pay special attention to the base of the glove where the hand goes in (known as the heel) and work the glove by hand back and forth in between the mallet beatings along the hinge and heel as well as the pocket. Afterwards, repeat several days in a row without adding any more conditioner by putting it into the dryer with the towels/water and continue to use the mallet and work it by hand. I had DD's Nokona fielding glove in shape and ready for use in two weeks with this method and after 4 years, other than having to re-string it, it's still going strong.

The conditioner actually breaks down the leather slightly but if you overuse it, it can make the glove very sloppy and useless after it completely breaks in. Thus, do not use it more than every 2-3 weeks. I prefer 3 week intervals if necessary to re-use it. That way it doesn't continue to break down the leather through regular practice and game use.

I never understood why you would beat the crap out of a glove with a mallet when you would be better off just playing catch with your DD. Occasionally use some glove conditioner and store the glove with a softball in it to help keep its shape. That's it. Why the need to complicate the process with clothes dryers, special mallets, running it over with a car, steamers, voo doo....

Use a pitching machine at a high setting to help break it in...

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Unless it's a really dry hard leather like horween, which it's not, no oil or conditioner yet. Just play with it, make sure your DD concentrates on catching the ball in the pocket on every catch and really focus on squeezing the mitt around the ball. These new gloves are so oil infused you shouldn't need to apply any for a while.

Rocketech1 said:

I never understood why you would beat the crap out of a glove with a mallet when you would be better off just playing catch with your DD. Occasionally use some glove conditioner and store the glove with a softball in it to help keep its shape. That's it. Why the need to complicate the process with clothes dryers, special mallets, running it over with a car, steamers, voo doo....

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I'm not beating the crap out of anything with the mallet. Simply using the mallet to replicate playing some catch when we don't feel like playing catch in a downpour.

No clothes dryers,car,etc. being used.

Rocketech1 said:

I never understood why you would beat the crap out of a glove with a mallet when you would be better off just playing catch with your DD. Occasionally use some glove conditioner and store the glove with a softball in it to help keep its shape. That's it. Why the need to complicate the process with clothes dryers, special mallets, running it over with a car, steamers, voo doo....

Click to expand...

My DD and I aren't that patient.

Our Vinci Kip leather Catchers mitt needed many good beatings...

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