Wednesday, March 9, 2016

Golf Gloves on Baseball Cards

Ken "Hawk" Harrelson is credited with being the first player to wear a glove while batting in a Major League game during the 1963 season. The story goes that he wasn't expecting to play one day against the Yankees and so he spent the morning playing 27 holes of golf and when he got to the ballpark he saw he was in the starting lineup. During batting practice he noticed a blister from all the golf and so he decided to wear his golf glove during the game. Not only did it help him protect his blister, but he hit two home runs. 

The practice of wearing a golfing glove was not uncommon during batting practice, prior to 1963, and some say that Bobby Thompson first wore a glove while batting during the 1949 Spring Training, almost 15 years before. 


Recently I've been on the lookout for pre-1963 cards featuring players wearing a "batting" glove. 


Here's a 1961 Topps card of Johnny Romano that I picked up recently for a dime, which features him wearing a batting glove.  




Let me know what pre-1963 cards you have in your collection that feature a player wearing a "batting" glove. 

1 comment:

  1. Great history lesson. Never even thought to consider researching the first guy to wear a batting glove... but that's some awesome baseball trivia.

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