CHARLOTTE, N.C. - During an appearance on The Charlie Rose Show on PBS, Panthers owner Jerry Richardson said this about Cam Newton's appearance: "I said do you have any tattoos? He said 'No sir, I don't have any.' I said do you have any piercings? He said 'No sir, I don't have any.' I said well we wanna keep it that way."

Do you think it matters if Cam rocks ink and ice? Here's a collection of the answers we received from people in Uptown Thursday: "It's his own thing if he wants tattoos he should be able to have tattoos." "It's better to have nothing and not be offending others and just represent our community."  "That's freedom of speech, freedom of expression."  "How can you tell me that I'm not allowed to have tattoos?"  "Well, if my boss is paying me $22 million, I'd listen to him."

"I actually thought that it was about time," says SouthPark's Courtenay Wardell.  She is a mom to three, a contributor on the parenting website www.CharlotteSmartyPants.com and a Panthers fan.

She's glad her kids will be able to  look up to a clean cut athlete and she believes Richardson is looking out for Newton's best interest as well as his own.  Wardell says, "What Jerry Richardson was doing was looking at the young man, that he's making a massive investment in and saying you need to think about the long term."

"As an owner of a team, you have control over how your team is represented to the public and through the media," says Sterling Scott, a marketing communications consultant.

Besides kids, parents and the Charlotte community, Scott says Cam's clean-cut image is also good for Cam, business-wise.  Scott says, "If there's any sign whatsoever that you could be trouble for their image or their organization, they're gonna have difficulty trying to convince the people cutting the budget to invest in an endorsement deal with the player."

But what if the tat was a cat? What would Jerry say about that?  One man wonders the same, saying "What if he (Cam) wanted to get a Panthers tattoo?"

We checked and no Panthers starting quarterback has had visible tattoos.