This year for Christmas, Santa brought my 8-year old son his first catcher's mitt -- a Rawlings SLCM. It's small enough where he can start to squeeze it, and big enough where he can use it for a few years. He was excited because now Rawlings will let you engrave your name on the mitt, and his came with his name. As we're getting ready for his season, I'm teaching him about oiling the mitt and making a nice pocket. While we're doing it, I'm showing him mine.
I was a catcher for 15 years, and still have my last Rawlings RL-10 Johnny Bench model, which dates back to 1985. I try to oil it every year even though I haven't played hardball since the early 90's. I help coach my son's team, so it does get used. The thing is, the laces and webbing are in pretty bad shape. It's never been relaced, but I think now it's time. I was wondering if any of you out there have anyone you'd recommend to restore this beauty. There are tons of them if I Google, but I'd prefer to go to someone recommended.
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I'm in Cal, but a lot of sporting good stores sell relacing kits now. If the leather is messed up you might have a tougher time fixing it yourself. I've coached for quite a while and laced a lot of gloves for the kids. Once you get your glove right, no new glove can compare.
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I've done repair jobs on gloves, both mine and kids I've coached, but never a full relacing. I was going to go all out and treat old faithful like it should be treated...
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I remember that when I was a little kid, 40+ years ago, my dad told me that cobblers relaced gloves. I guess there aren't many cobblers left these days, maybe you will get lucky and find one that does this.
Good luck.
Smokin Gator is a leather craftsman, maybe he can turn you on to someone who does this sort of work.
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