It could be assumed that when you are believed to be the only active Major League Baseball player who still works with BALCO founder Victor Conte, you don't really care what people think about your body art.
Outfielder Marlon Byrd showed up at Chicago Cubs Spring Training camp in better shape and with a very presidential tattoo. The journeyman centerfielder completely covered his right forearm with excerpts from President Theodore Roosevelt's iconic "Man in the Arena" speech from 1910.
Here's an excerpt (via Theodore-Roosevelt.com) from that speech delivered by America's 26th President in Paris, France on April 23, 1910.
"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."full story >>
