Research Shows Tom Brady Plays Better With Facial Hair
BOSTON (CBS) - November is here, which means men everywhere are letting their facial hair grow exponentially to raise awareness for 'Movember', 'No Shave November' and other men's health related causes.
Nowhere is this trend more evident than in the National Football League, where big, burly, lumberjack-looking men are front and center for the national audience multiples times per week.
File this one away in the "WTF" category, but new research indicates that Tom Brady and other quarterbacks around the National Football League play better with a little scruff on their face.
You read correctly.
Quarterbacks play better with beards, and we have the data to prove it.
West Coast Shaving performed an original research project that looked at every roster photo in the NFL from 2014 to note the different hairstyles and facial hair combinations.
SEE ALSO: 11 Best Beards In The NFL
The first part of their analysis took a look at the most popular haircuts and broke it down into five distinct categories: Short Hair/Buzz Cut, Medium Hair, Dreadlocks, Long Hair and Bald.
The New England Patriots sit atop the AFC with an 8-2 record, and research shows they also lead the league in medium haircuts -- by almost 5 percentage points!
But there's more.
The investigation also analyzed the most popular facial hairstyles across the league, and the Patriots are league leaders again -- this time for 5 o'clock shadows.
With 11 percent of the NFL maintaining 5 o'clock shadows, the Patriots are more than double the league average.
But perhaps the most eyebrow-raising (or should we say mustache-raising) piece of information was how haircuts and facial hair correlates to performance on the field. What they found was that some of the best quarterbacks in the league play better with a more whiskered look.
Now now.
I know what you're probably thinking.
What does it all mean?
Like all those stats fans and experts pour over week after week, this could mean nothing. Or it could mean something. Or IT COULD MEAN EVERYTHING.
Here's what I do know: when in doubt, grow it out.
Read more from Andrew Celani by clicking here, or find him on Twitter @ACE_Worldwide.
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