headings provided herein are for convenience only and do not interpret the scope or meaning of the claimed invention the following description relates generally to a device for cleaning the sole of an athletic shoe and enhancing the traction between the sole and an athletic playing surface such as a basketball court tennis court volleyball court or the like fig1 shows one particular embodiment of a traction enhancing device 10 and an athletic shoe 12 having a sole 14 the shoe 12 is depicted as a basketball shoe 12 but it is understood that the shoe 12 may be any suitable type of shoe the sole 14 is typically made from a rubber or rubber like material and generally has a fairly non aggressive tread pattern e g generally smooth with only small ridges and bumps to achieve a large amount of surface area fig2 shows the traction enhancing device 10 having a handle 16 a frame 18 and a roller 20 rotationally coupleable to the frame the handle 16 can be made from a soft over molded thermoplastic elastomer such as santoprene u00ae available from the monsanto corporation or tekbond u00ae available from the teknor apex corporation or other suitable materials the durometer range of the illustrated handle 16 is about 20 100 shore a and preferably in the range of about 40 60 shore a this range permits the handle 16 to have some amount of resiliency and be easily gripped the handle 16 can have a number of recessed regions 22 each being adjacent to a raised region 24 and these regions can be configured to make the handle generally conform to a human hand in addition the recessed and raised regions 22 24 can help keep the handle 16 from slipping in.