Glove: Legal or Illegal?

[CecilOne]

Originally Posted by Manny A

I suppose one could argue that 12-inch-long laces could give the defense an advantage when it came to tagging a runner. If on a swipe tag the fielder contacted the runner only with the laces while the ball was in the glove, would that be a legal tag? ..

Are the laces part of the glove or merely an attachment?

[Manny A]

Originally Posted by CecilOne

Are the laces part of the glove or merely an attachment?

If they're being used to hold the glove together, they're part of it. I view attachments as items that serve no useful purpose, such as a lucky rabbit's foot or a dreamcatcher.

That said, are there any restrictions to attachments on gloves in the rules? I know that in LL, there is a restriction to attachments of "foreign material" to the pitcher's glove, where "foreign material" entails any item not attached by the manufacturer. No such restriction exists for other fielders.

I don't recall ever seeing anything similar in ASA, FED, or NCAA. The latter has something close under rule 3.7.2, where it says, "The use of any treatment or device that fundamentally changes the specifications of gloves is prohibited and renders the equipment altered and unsuitable for play." I wouldn't consider extra-long laces as a "device" that changes the glove's specs.