Why Joey Votto should sport a beard during the 2021 season

Beards protect the skin from harmful UV rays.

Not shaving means fewer chances for creating ingrown hairs, and the painful abcesses than often follow.

In the cold April evenings on the north side of Chicago, a beard will keep the chilly Wrigley breeze from sending shivers down the spine.

Beards make one look older, and the only thing cooler than watching 37 year old Joey Votto sock dingers is watching a 37 year old Joey Votto who looks like a 41 year old Joey Votto socking dingers.

Zack Cozart once grew a beard, and while donning said beard went on an All Star tear that earned him both a $39 million contract from the Angels and a donkey from his most friendly teammate - Joey Votto (who, in turn, could earn a donkey by sporting a beard and playing All Star ball in 2021).

Shaving everyday eats up more time than you realize. Even just five minutes of lathering, shaving, rinsing, and after-shaving each and every day during the long baseball season adds up quickly, eventually wasting decades of one’s life in the process. That’s time that could be spend in the batting cage perfecting slap-singles that beat the shift and booming 500 foot dingers that fly right over it.

At age 37, Votto is undeniably getting up there in age in baseball terms. One benefit of a beard, though, is that while keeping your face out of the sun, it helps reduce wrinkles, too.

We know finances are tight for the Reds right now, but it’s a little known fact that when you grow a beard, you end up with red hairs sprouting out whether that’s your natural hair color or not. Joey Votto sporting a red beard while playing for the Reds would allow Votto to double as a mascot for the year, too.

Finally, a bearded Joey Votto would put a beard on 1B everyday. He’d be next to Mike Moustakas, a 2B who, like a bearded Votto, sports a beard.

Photo by Hannah Foslien/Getty Images

Across the diamond will be Eugenio Suarez, he of the 49 dingers donked in a single season in 2019. He, too, is the proud owner of a fuzzy facecoat.

Photo by Brace Hemmelgarn/Minnesota Twins/Getty Images

That would leave them just a bestubbled shortstop away from an infield with the best facial hair coverage in the game, and we all know the perfect way to round that out...