More Baseball baseball equipment news – glove, bat, and more baseball gear reviews

Evoshield’s New Batting Gloves with Slide-in Protective Hand Guard

Evoshield made a new batting glove that lets you insert one of their custom-molding "shields" to protect the back of your lead, or bottom hand while batting.

And these new Evoshield batting gloves launched for the 2012 baseball season are so hot, they were almost sold out before the season even started!

At a price of $59.99 they're probably the most expensive batting gloves on the market (most high end batting gloves cost around $40), but players clearly want them as badly as they religiously use Evoshield's other protective gear.

Evoshield released their "Pro Style" batting gloves in sizes S-XXL and in three colors (black, gray, and white). But they've sold so well, here's all that's available at last check.

Eastbay - only XL Gray
Amazon - sizes Large and up, in gray or black
Baseball Express - XL black, XXL gray

If you want to know when other sizes and colors are available, join our email list and we'll let you know.

Key Features of Evoshield Batting Gloves

With a Pittards leather palm and a thick wrist band, the Evoshield feels like a high-quality batting glove. But it's no secret that the roughly $20 extra you're paying is for the insertable protective shield.

Evoshield representatives confirmed to me that each pair of batting gloves comes with only one shield, because it's meant to be used for your lead hand. The custom-molding protective shield comes in a foil pouch. You just open it, take the shield and insert it into your batting glove, and wear the glove until the shield hardens.

Here's a diagram we made pointing out key features of the Evoshield protective batting glove.

Evoshield Batting Glove Videos

Here's a video of Evoshield's director of baseball sales talking about the launch of their batting gloves.

Here's a video where Evoshield batting gloves and wrist guards are used to imitate the Under Armour click clack commercials.

New Miami Marlins Caps: new logo, the hot orange road hat, where to get the best price

In case you missed the news while hibernating this winter, the Florida Marlins got tons of new stuff…
- new name, Miami Marlins
- new stadium, Marlins Park near downtown Miami
- new manager, f@#%ing Ozzie Guillen
- new players Jose Reyes, Mark Buehrle, and Heath Bell

- ...and most noticeably, a slick new logo…which has made the new Miami Marlins caps some of the hottest MLB merchandise right now.

In fact, the new road/away Marlins orange cap has sold so well that it's currently on backorder at MLB Shop (see screencap).

But you can still get it elsewhere. Here are the best places (and prices) for grabbing the new Miami Marlins hats.

Where to buy the new Miami Marlins official on-field cap

The list price for official New Era "59Fifty MLB Authentic Collection" caps is $34.99, and you'll see them for full price at New Era and full price at MLB Shop. Tack on those stores' $4.95 and $2.95 shipping, and you're at $38-$40 before tax

So if you want to save a few bucks, it's better to buy the new Marlins hat from Lids or Starstruck, or possibly Amazon.

Lids:

• get the black cap or the orange cap
• coupon: if you buy before the end of Opening Day, use coupon code LIDSMLB for 25% off to drop it to $26.25 (better than even the usual 20% Lids membership discount)
• shipping: free ship to a Lids store, $4.99 to home, or free ship to home on orders $50+

Starstruck (probably the cheapest for a single cap)

• get the black cap or the orange cap
• should start at $31.49, then use coupon code SSAF2012 for another 10% off
• that's $28.34, then select the $1.99 shipping option in checkout...$30.33 total
• no sales tax in most states - only in Illinois!

Amazon
They list the black cap and the orange cap, but the prices and sellers vary widely across cap sizes.

Looks like Amazon sold a few themselves at $26.99, a killer price, but they're all out of stock. Still, it looks like you can grab a few sizes for about $30-$32 shipped from random sellers on Amazon.

Other cap styles with the new Miami Marlins logo

Lids has a bunch of other styles besides the on-field cap.

Or check Eastbay. They carry a New Era snapback and several styles under $20 - a few New Era practice styles and a Nike Dri-fit version

DeMarini Wants to Know “What D Stick Are You Swingin?” This Weekend

This has to be the most lewd tweet by a baseball equipment company we've seen in a while.

And, fittingly, the first reply on Twitter is from a chick Northwestern softball's shortstop, who both answers it seriously "black CF4 drop 9" and adds the hashtag #springbreak2012.

Yo, @DeMarini, you can't tweet about "swingin a D stick" and expect not to get called out on it.

Happy Friday #DeMariniNation! Where are the games this weekend and what D stick are you swingin'?

March 16, 2012 9:01 am via HootSuiteReplyRetweetFavorite

@DeMarini

DeMarini

3n2 launches My3N2 for customizing your team cleats and uniforms

Mostly-softball brand 3N2 Sports just publicly launched "My3N2," their tool that allows you to design and customize your own cleats and uniforms.

After opening the "pre-launch" in late November 2011, they're now saying the software is in beta.

This is our beta launch: a fully featured sandbox where you can customize product for your team and purchase it in time for the 2012 season. However, being in beta, you are bound to encounter some rough edges.

My3N2 requires Flash and Unity 3D web player (I had to install that.. never heard of it) and it doesn't work with the Chrome browser, but after I got the tech stuff lined up, it worked pretty smoothly.

First step, you pick the shoe model you'd like to customize.

As of February 21, 2011, they offered 4 trainer / turf shoe variations, 4 women's cleats, and 1 model of men's cleats, the Rally PM metal spikes.

Next, you have to name your customization project and they give you the option to include your design in a public gallery that other people can use as inspiration for starting their designs.

This part made me realize it really is for team use (and kinda weird that they'd call it "My3N2" which sounds very personal / individualized). The custom Rally PM men's cleat will cost $90 each, with a minimum order of 12 pairs.

For comparison, buying the pre-made Rally PM direct from 3N2 costs $84.99, available in 8 color schemes.

Or you can get the Rally PM spikes in your choice of 5 color schemes for only $69.99 at Eastbay.

The My3N2 tool then takes you through choosing colors for FOURTEEN parts of the shoe (I didn't even know it was possible to have 14...and that's just for the upper).

• Cordura color
• Leather strapping
• Quarter leather
• Removable tongue flap
• Eyelet border
• Shoelaces
• Toe Cup
• Toe Bumper
• Mud Guard Leather
• Quarter Strapping
• Ankle Loop
• 3N2 Tongue Logo
• 3N2 Quarter Logo
• 3N2 Heel Logo

I was exhausted after 3 or 4 choices, and then just started picking white, or whichever color I could choose quickest.

Throughout this process, you can zoom in/out and rotate the shoe all the way around to inspect your design choices. Guess that 3D software plug-in comes in handy.

Finally -- we get to the upsell. You can swap in your custom logo in place of the 3N2 logo on the tongue ($5 extra) and on the heel (another $5). If you did both, you'd be up to $100 for each pair of cleats.

When you're done designing, you're asked to enter names and sizes for your 12+ unit team order. Then just pay your $1,000+ total bill and call it a day.

They say "orders are typically processed in 4-6 weeks from time of artwork confirmation."

Overall, it's a pretty cool tool, but I think you'd have to REALLY, REALLY WANT some custom team cleats to carefully make 16 design decisions, get 11 teammates to buy in to your design and the cost, especially when you can get the same cleats in 5 different colors for up to $30 less at Eastbay.

Yup, after all that work, resulting in my kinda crappy / too-busy-looking design and the $90+ price tag...the $70 pre-made cleats through Eastbay are looking like a big relief and a good value to me.

MLB 2K12 Releases March 6, feat. Justin Verlander and…Kate Upton?

So MLB 2K12 is coming out on March 6th and it's probably a safe bet that more people know that the new Sports Illustrated Swimsuit cover model Kate Upton is promoting the game than that the reigning Cy Young winner and AL MVP Justin Verlander is on the game's cover.

Anyway, the game will be available for Xbox 360, PS3, PS2, PSP, Nintendo Wii, DS, and PC. Click here to see 'em on Amazon.

And like last year, there's a million dollar challenge involving throwing a perfect game. But instead of just the first perfect game winning the million, this year you have to win a tournament of the 8 people with the top verified perfect games thrown from April 4th (MLB Opening Day) through April 30th.

Official contest page is at http://www.2ksports.com/perfectclub but check this out from the fine print...

GRAND PRIZE WILL NOT BE AWARDED UNLESS AN ELIGIBLE ENTRANT THROWS A PERFECT GAME BY 4/30/12.

Wouldn't that be a bummer?!

Here's the

Kate Upton commercial for MLB 2K12

, entitled "Finger Mechanics" (how clever and provocative)

So now that you know how to throw a circle change (take your thumb, go up and then around)... here's the

MLB 2K12 commercial with Justin Verlander and CJ Wilson

entitled "Verlander vs Verlander" in which Verlander makes a bunch of weird faces and talks about being a ninja or cheetah or ninja blah blah.

MLB 2K12 official trailer

this one should be just called "Freaking Awesome"

More MLB 2K12

ESPN: Stephen Strasburg's advice for pitching on MLB 2K12

Kotaku: in-depth game preview including business/financial issues inside 2K Sports, game design decisions, analysis of 2K12's game mechanics and strategy

Amazon: go there and scroll down for more details on specific game features, new additions, and some nice big screengrabs of Verlander, David Price, and CJ Wilson

Nike SHA|DO Cleats and Gloves Make Us Wanna Play High School Baseball in Japan

Nike Japan just released the super sweet SHA|DO collection of baseball cleats and gloves for high school baseball in Japan.

Nike Inc.'s site says this about the SHA|DO or Shadow name:

"The name SHA|DO (“SHA” for Gratitude and “DO” for Way in Japanese) speaks to the spirit of always playing with a sense of gratitude, as well as the message that the skills [honed] during the three years in high school are the result of everyday practices from dawn to late night, i.e., behind-the-scenes (shadow) efforts."

You can browse the new Shado cleats and gloves on Nike Japan's baseball site at http://nikebaseball.jp/ but we've had some problems loading the site, so we took screencaps for you.

Below are some photos from the official announcement, then pictures of the Nike Shadow cleats and then gloves.

Since we used Google translate to convert the Japanese to English so you can notice some details about each product's materials and where it's made, but some words/phrases will be a little wacky so don't take them literally.

Nike SHA|DO Collection Announcement

Here are a few more pictures from the official announcement of the Nike Shadow baseball gear collection. To see the full gallery, visit http://nikeinc.com/news/japan-baseball.

Nike Japan SHA|DO Cleats

The featured cleat in the Nike Shadow footwear lineup is the Nike Fly Leather J Elite SHA|DO, which includes the same Nike Flywire technology we're seeing in more Nike shoes in the U.S. It's available in low cut or mid-high and has a traditional leather sole found in most Japanese baseball cleats.

Below those, you'll see a couple "Lady" cleat models and then the Nike Zoom Elite Fly and Nike Air Clipper.

Nike Japan SHA|DO Gloves

Here are the Nike SHADO / Shadow gloves for 2012. They're all made in Japan from Kip leather. You'll see models for infield, pitcher, catcher, first base, and outfield.

Not sure why you'd want a color other than black, but you'll see most Nike Shadow gloves are also available in brown and orange (coming in April 2012).