Breaking in a glove can be a time-consuming and difficult process. But it can also be a fun and interesting one if you employ the best methods of doing so. In this post we detail the best methods to break-in your baseball glove in the most time-efficient and effective manner:

Best Method: Playing Catch

  • Cliche, but breaking your mitt in by playing catch allows your glove to truly break in to how your squeeze your hand. This makes the glove both more comfortable and easier to close over time.
  • A hack to make this easier is to find a flat concrete or brick wall and throw dimpled baseballs at the wall. They’ll come back at you, replicate the act of having a catch, and help break-in your glove without another person.
  • This is the most time-consuming method, but it truly is the best method to break-in your glove the most natural way. Plus, there are many other skill-related benefits to having regular catches to break-in your glove.

An OK Method: Hot Water and a Mallet

  • Wilson’s Aso has recommended this method for years, in which you pour hot water over the pocket of your glove and hit the pocket of your glove with a wooden glove mallet. Here’s a video displaying the process.
  • This method will break-in your mitt very quickly, but at the expense of slightly damaging the leather of your mitt. Hot water will certainly help loosen the leather, but it harms the long-term durability of it as well.
  • We only recommend this method for players who need their gloves broken-in quickly or who only use their gloves for a short time. If you are looking to keep your glove in-shape for a longer time, we recommend simply playing catch.

What You Shouldn’t Do

Glove Steaming: A process in which you or someone else heats your mitt in a steamer, oven, or microwave. This breaks the glove in quickly, but it damages the leather of the glove significantly. We wouldn’t recommend in pretty much any circumstance.

Running Over Your Glove with a Car: This flattens the glove, giving it a broken-in feel, but it creates an unnatural squeeze that’s going to be uncomfortable. Never recommended.

Glove Wrap: Wrapping your glove with a rubber band and a baseball in pocket is a decent way to store your glove, but a bad one to break one in. This also creates an unnatural squeeze and honestly doesn’t really break-in your glove all that much.