Does playing scruff-free actually help athletes perform better? Could be, if you believe the results of a study conducted by Philips Norelco and the Elias Sports Bureau.

They tracked the performance of three MLB baseball players, Nick Swisher, Freddy Garcia and Johnny Damon, to see how they performed on the field, with and without facial hair.

Here's what they found:
Swisher: When Swish shaved his scruff, analysis showed improvements in nearly every category, including hits (150 to 137), homers (29 to 28), doubles (35 to 31) and triples (2 to 1) averaged. Swisher is also hitting at a .313 clip and boasts a 1.033 OPS over his last 10 clean-shaven games.

Garcia: Career clean-shaven ERA is almost a full run lower than bearded: 3.60 clean compared to 4.34 when he lets it grow. His wins jump 2 and his losses drop 2 as well, meaning an average clean-shaven year puts him at 13-6. (However, his walk rate jumped when clean shaven. Maybe the facial hair gave him better control...)

Damon: This former owner of one of the all-time great baseball beards might feel that his facial locks may have been his biggest mistake, as almost all of his career highs came when he lost his hairy look. Most interesting is the beard’s effect on Johnny’s wheels, as he’s averaged 9 fewer stolen bases when bearded than when clean.

So does this mean the end of the playoff beard? Or if you shave you'll perform better? Probably not. Unless you're an Olympic swimmer.

For more results of the study, head to GreatShaveDebate.com