Need advice from the you guys.........unobtainable glove or divorce??

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Jul 29, 2013
6,782
113
North Carolina
Need advice from you guys.........unobtainable glove or divorce??

Okay, it’s nothing serious, I’m happily married, most days. Here’s my situation, we have a couple at our church, this guy works for a Japanese company, several years back he went to Tokyo for several months for work and absolutely fell in love with it over there!

There’s a start up church just outside of Tokyo that our church helps sponsor, and this couple’s 25th wedding anniversary was coming up so the husband decided to go help this church for a couple of weeks, celebrate their anniversary, and go Japanese sight seeing.

Here’s the cool part of this story.....at least to me, it’s glove related :rolleyes:. They have a rail pass, they’re traveling everywhere by train. I contacted this guy, and BTW, I know this guy very well, great guy and great couple! Anyway I contacted this guy and was telling him about one of two Kubota Slugger stores right outside of Tokyo, he looked it up and said “yeah, we’ve already got a scheduled trip to that town next week! WHAT? ARE YOU SERIOUS?

Brain gears are smoking at this point......then he says, you want me to pick you up a glove?? Oh Lord my wife will kill me if I buy a $700 / $800 glove! Which with a little research, that number is close! What would you do? These gloves are expensive, hard to get, and this opportunity, with a buddy walking in a store in Japan, and walking out with a Kubota Slugger in hand will probably never happen again!

BUT........the downside is, Japanese patterns are weird / strange at best, they love very small gloves. And the thought of spending that kind of money on a glove I can’t put my hand in is a little hard to swallow, plus I could buy 3.5 Rawlings Horween exclusives, or 2.5 Rawlings customs that (I) designed myself for that amount of money!

But man these gloves are beautiful, rare, well somewhat rare here, and the quality is supposed to be super high! Decisions decisions?? Help a board brother out with the smart, logical thing to do!
 

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May 19, 2016
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You only live once. But seeing how your hand will never fit in it, it would be the one and only glove I’d buy for looks alone and to sit on display. So I’d ask myself if I were you.....is this glove really my holy grail of gloves? If not I’d just move on.
 
Feb 10, 2016
77
18
Illinois
But how will you ever know if the glove is as good as they say unless you are able to use it? I say you buy it but only if you plan to use it
 
Jun 14, 2018
172
28
I always tell my wife I am going to look at something... and then I buy it. When she ask I just tell her it was on "sale", which is her favorite line to use when she goes shopping. I say go for it but tell her you were just looking and found a really good deal that you couldn't pass up!
 
Jul 29, 2013
6,782
113
North Carolina
You only live once. But seeing how your hand will never fit in it, it would be the one and only glove I’d buy for looks alone and to sit on display. So I’d ask myself if I were you.....is this glove really my holy grail of gloves? If not I’d just move on.

I’m thinking I’m liking this reply the best......my grail (a tan Horween NP6 with a RV23 web) will probably never exist! There’s some really nice Horween gloves in the works in the near future so that’s probably the direction I’ll go. And Shawn, no it wouldn’t just sit!
 
Jul 29, 2013
6,782
113
North Carolina
I always tell my wife I am going to look at something... and then I buy it. When she ask I just tell her it was on "sale", which is her favorite line to use when she goes shopping. I say go for it but tell her you were just looking and found a really good deal that you couldn't pass up!

Okay Fort, here’s where you logic will never work here at my house, my wife who happens to be a math major knows the upper end of composite bats are usually $349, and the upper end of a custom Rawlings HOH is $359. And cash here (squirrel money :cool:) is king if you know what I mean, wink wink!

So a $800 charge on a CC for a ball glove would never look like a “deal” in her eyes.......ever! If I was smart I would have planned ahead and stuffed a pocketful of cash in this guys pocket before he left.
 
Jul 29, 2013
6,782
113
North Carolina
Found a couple more interesting pics of some Sluggers, for me, an American, these glove models are somewhat difficult to decipher. Between the Hard ball and Rubber ball models, I definitely want a Hard ball model. Once Japanese players get to high school they switch from the Rubber ball to the Hard ball, the Hard ball gloves are beefier with better internals.

Most outfield gloves max out at 12.5" with some infield patterns as small as 10" & 11". It almost seems like there's 5 Japanese glove models (this is a broad assumption on my part), Pitcher's gloves, Catcher's mitts, 1B mitt's, infield gloves, and outfield gloves......seems simple enough right? We here in America are spoiled, I know I am, if tomorrow I want a 1/4" larger glove than I'm playing with today, I'll replace my 12" Pro1000 with my 12.25" Pro207 or NP7. I'm rambling on, I really just wanted to start a new glove thread, hasn't been a new one here in a while, seems like everyone here's DD just hits and never plays defense?

Got the Hard ball / Rubber ball pic from a guy over at SBF who's really well versed on true Japanese gloves, interesting photo!
 

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