Customer Reviews

Glove Affairs: The Romance, History, and Tradition of the Baseball Glove

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

A well researched, written and needed book on one of baseball's fascinating subjects: the baseball glove. Liberman has touched all the bases and ... fingers on this
equipment topic.
My favorites and I'm sure many readers will find highly interesting, are the interviews with former and current major leaguers, the men who trusted and trust their living with this tool.
It's a fine catch for any baseball fan.

I must say upfront that I am not a glove collecter, so my perspective may be different from the other gentleman. However I am a true baseball fan. A big part of the enjoyment of baseball when you are young is getting your first baseball glove. For me, it started with an old hand-me -down fom my father - so seeing a lot of the old gloves and pictures of the great baseball stars was enjoyable. The bottom line is that this book lived up to the reason I bought it ... it was FUN to read for me. I am going to give it to my son to read and I think it would be an excellant book for all little league players as well. It is obvious that the author has a real passion for the baseball glove and wrote a book that reflected that. I especially enjoyed the stories, the ideosynchrasies of different professional players and the illustrations. I learned a lot of things about the baseball glove that I did not know. I highly recommend it.

This is one of the most interesting baseball books I've read in a long time. Saw a positive review in the Tampa Tribune and so I bought it for my son, but I ended up reading it this weekend before he got to it! I never thought there was so much to know about the old glove...and the quotes are great. I'm not sure what Fuzzy's beef is about the pictures, because they're very vivid, they tell a great story. Lots of close-ups, plus action shots. I wish I still had my first glove now...

This is a wonderful book. It's well written, has a good variety of information and is very attractive in it's presentation, plus it's "accessible" to all types of baseball fans. If you're a glove aficionado (which I am not) perhaps you'll not find all you would hope for here, but that sort of book wouldn't be anywhere near as useful. Oh, and I grew up across the street from Noah Liberman and we played lots of sandlot ball together, although I've not seen him in two decades. Reading his book makes me miss those good old days. I still have the glove I used back then but I have to admit it's got some mildew, and I know that's at least one strike against me.

If you were ever interested in how the baseball glove evolved this is the book.

This is an interesting book to be sure. It's full of baseball glove lore, history, and stories from the majors. You'll pick up some helpful tips on glove break-in and repair, and stories about specific players' relationships with their gloves.

My gripe? The book relies almost entirely on secondary sources. It appears the author went online or to the library and searched for any existing interviews of major leaguers who mentioned their gloves, then strung these snippets together for the book. It makes for splintered writing, as if the author's only goal were to make it to the next snippet. There appear to be no primary or first hand player interviews, no trip to the Baseball Hall of Fame to research the history of baseball gloves or interview the curators there, no direct contact with Rawlings or Wilson for input from the companies, etc. For these reasons I felt the book was a little flat and could have been improved.

Still, a nice book on a subject lacking coverage elsewhere.

This is a fun book for anybody who loves baseball, and especially for those who love the feel of a baseball glove fitting just right on their hand and hearing the 'pop' of a ball as it smacks into the pocket. Liberman gives a well researched and well illustrated history of the development of baseball gloves, along with many stories and testimonials from both professionals and regular folks. He provides chapters on breaking in, maintaining, and restoring (with careful attention to a good sequence for complete re-lacing) baseball gloves. This book is a great catch, and you will be glad to have it in your hands.

This is a really neat book. Very different. It covers lots of angles on gloves. Famous people remember their first glove, the history of the glove, pro players and all their insights about gloves, plus fixing a glove and buying a glove and breaking them in. It's nostalgic, but it doesn't hit you over the head with the nostalgia and all that like a lot of baseball books do. These glove collectors on www.Amazon.com seem to have a beef about the book not being a reference book for them, but I wouldn't want that kind of book. This one covers all of the bases!

This book received many nominations for the 2003 CASEY Award. Amazingly, it is the first book on its subject. Nominators obviously thought it is a very fun book to read and have. What will the CASEY judges think?

Being a lifelong baseball fan and a collector of vintage baseball gloves for over ten years, I anticipated this book's release since the end of 2002. I'm extremely disappointed; trivial content, numerous mistakes, and lackluster photography. I was expecting a doctoral thesis but wound up reading a D- freshman term paper. I can name dozens of glove collectors who could have written a more informative book.