My two older daughters are pretty much hooked on softball. They are 14 and 10yrs and playing their 3rd year now. The oldest played ss mostly and occasionally 1st or 3rd. Her last game the team was in a bind needing a catcher so I told the coach to put her in the catchers spot if needed. He asked me, "You think she'll do it?" I said, "Yeah, if you tell her and don't ask her." Well, he was tickled with her as catcher and she loved playing catcher cuz it's non stop action. My middle daughter played ss until this year when the coach asked her to catch and she excelled at it. So let's get to the thread title. We went browsing last weekend looking at catchers gloves for the oldest girl. I already bought the middle daughter complete catchers gear back in the spring. Finding softball gloves around here is tough. There just aren't many options. There are like two catchers glove options and although we have hands on experience with both we wanted something different and that'd last longer since she seems pretty serious about staying hooked for years to come. I started googling and ran across Nokona gloves in Nocona, Tx. They claim to be the last American ball glove manufacturer and that most of the others moved out of the U.S. in the 60's. They've been building gloves in Nocona since 1934. We looked across their website and read reviews then decided they were a company we wanted to support. Yes, this glove cost 5 times what we've paid for gloves at Academy. I know a thing or 6 about leather and can say the leather in this glove is way mo gooder than the gloves ya find in town. This glove ain't soft and floppy like the town glove and will need broke in but that's a good thing in my opinion. It should fit her right and won't fold up when she tries to catch a ball at the end of the glove. Yes some of the Wilson or Rawlings's gloves in town do use this quality of leather but they cost just as much as this glove and they arent softball gloves because I guess the stores don't have enough demand. Plus, Wilson and Rawlings ain't American made. There are some neat stories/videos on YouTube for any of y'all interested in Nokona ball gloves. Some of y'all that "know" me from OSA won't be surprised that I'm now considering building a ball glove myself just cuz I've got the equipment and leather and a miteiswell attitude bout building stuff. Anyhow, this ain't got a thing in the world to do with chootin but maybe some the rest y'all got lil ball players in your life too!
