New York Giants receiever Odell Beckham Jr., fresh off another mind-bending one-handed catch, is once again hearing grumblings that those catches wouldn’t be possible without the latest technology in sticky gloves. And once again, he is denying those claims in a very reasonable and patient way — more than they deserve.
“You know, your quarterbacks are throwing forty miles per hour in a spiral,” he said. “When you go without gloves, it doesn’t feel good when the ball hits your hand a certain way. The gloves are really there to help with the friction. They don’t make you catch a football.”
If they don’t make you catch a football, at the very least they help. Beckham is the first to admit that.
“They definitely could help you, if you got the right ones on,” he said. “But I could never give credit to my gloves for something that, you know, I sit there and practice doing. Like I said, [gloves] definitely help, but I don’t think [they are] the ultimate decider.”
Of course those gloves help Odell catch the ball — if they didn’t, he wouldn’t wear them. But if there’s one reason to support his usage of the gloves, it’s this: No one is complaining that Ted Ginn’s gloves give him an unfair advantage. They both wear sticky gloves, but Beckham is amazing at catching footballs and Ginn is subpar. The difference in talent is still what matters.
(Via Business Insider)
