Forgotten Superstars: Dick Slater

When I recently wrote about an array of passings, I mentioned the death of "Mr. Unpredictable" Dick Slater last month and that I would be working on a post on one of the more underrated stars of his day.

We have since seen two more wrestling stars of the past pass away (Dynamite Kid and Larry "The Axe" Hennig), and I'll be adding them in the passing posts later this week, which sadly has built up of late, but since there are so many, I wanted to finish this off.

Dick Slater was a main event level star in almost every territory that he ever wrestled in (except in the WWF, where he was forced into the "babyface" role of  "The Rebel" which didn't suit Slater's strengths), yet from what wrestlers and many fans say his best work cannot be found due to the lack of television tape from the 1970s.
Slater was known for "being more like Terry Funk than Terry Funk," and the people who saw the young Slater have been known to state that Slater's admiration for Funk's style actually took away from Slater, as many seeing Slater for the first time would think him a Terry Funk knock-off.
There were similarities, but Dick Slater was plenty good on his own.

Slater spent most of his career in his native Florida and Georgia, where he was known by nicknames such as "Mr. Unpredictable" and "Mr. Excitement", but formed one of the time's best tag teams with Bob Orton Jr in the Tennessee area in the late '70s and was a main part of two huge runs in the 1980s.
Slater with Orton were a major portion of the story, entering the sport's first showcase event in Starrcade in 1983 as the pair attempted to collect the bounty money posted by NWA champion Harley Race to make sure that Ric Flair was unable to challenge Race at Starrcade.
Flair would survive their attempts, although the pair did briefly injure Flair before Flair dethroned Race in Greensboro, NC.


Slater would have an even better run in the Mid-South area as the "booker" and as the company's North American champion with his valet Dark Journey, whom he was reported to have found in an Atlanta strip club as the company's lead heel.
This run was most famous for Slater, who held the North American title and the company's television title, and Journey's trip to a Tulsa, Oklahoma, bridge where he dropped the TV title medallion (the company wanted to start using a TV title belt) into the Arkansas River.

After Slater's time in Mid-South, he moved to the WWF as the Rebel, and it never seemed to be a good fit for him.
Slater would only have a short, but entertaining WCW run with Dick Murdoch as the Hardliners before his career ended.

Dick Slater was known as a legitimate tough guy with almost legendary stories.
Slater was a Tampa native, and it's been documented by several people about his bar fight with 6'8 300 300-pound NFL defensive lineman John Matuszak, where Slater knocked Matuszak cold and then woke his college teammate (Both played for the now-defunct Tampa football program) up and closed the bar.

Slater was also remembered for his locker room pounding of Sting when Slater thought (unsure if true or not) that Sting was involved with Dark Journey (Slater was dating her), destroyed him in seconds, and then gave Sting a "swirly", which is performed by stuffing someone's head into a toilet and then flushing it!

There were a few memories that I have of Dick Slater that are always good ones.
In the early 1980s, my brother and I were rabid fans but didn't have cable yet, so one of the best parts of vacations and trips to visit family was the once or twice-a-year chance to watch World Championship Wrestling.
I doubt I remember this correctly, but Slater did a run-in under a mask to enter the territory and attacked someone (I don't remember who) and then did an interview unmasking himself as "Mr. Excitement Dick Slater"!
The story goes that the crowd in the WTBS studio couldn't have cared less, and Shane and I got a laugh about how "excited" they were about "Mr. Excitement".
I'm not sure it happened that way, but I remember sharing the laughs!

Another memory saw the WWF hit Hagerstown with a card at North Hagerstown High School during Slater's "Rebel" stint.
Shane and I rooted for the "bad guys" and reveled in the good-natured back and forth with the standard fans.

On this night, Slater faced off against Canadian Dino Bravo, and this guy, who had been the loudest in rooting for his favorites and giving it back to us, suddenly turned to us as Slater's music, a version of the Confederacy theme, and hollered to us that "I'm with you guys for this match"!
The fan hollered that he was "against all things from the South" and therefore was rooting for the bad guy, Bravo!
I don't remember if Slater or Bravo won, but that incident alone showed that Slater and the gimmick weren't going to be a massive success in the McMahon era.

My final memory was from Slater's WWF time, when I saw him wrestle the Magnificent Muraco on a Saturday Night's Main Event that was more memorable for Muraco and manager Mr.Fuji's pre-match promo than anything in the ring.
I couldn't find a complete video, but it featured Mr. Fuji's halting version of "Dixie" complete with the Magnificent One (my childhood hero, as noted so many times) stomping along and shouting, "Hit it, Mr.Fuji"!!


Dick Slater was reported to have spent the final few years of his life in a nursing home after botched back surgery left him mostly bound in a wheelchair (although that didn't stop him from an altercation in 2004 from stabbing a girlfriend that resulted in a year of house arrest, Slater claimed that pain medication for the back contributed to the attack) and his quality of life wasn't very good by any means, but his wrestling career was an underrated one and we welcome him to the Forgotten Superstars universe. 

Cleaning out the inbox: Goodbyes

The inbox cleaning has four recent passings from the sports world with two of the four members of the Hall of Fame from their respective sports.

Goodbye to Baseball Hall of Famer Willie McCovey, who passed away at the age 80 from what the press release labeled "Ongoing health issues".
McCovey had been confined to a wheelchair in recent years and had a few health scares over the last ten years.
McCovey spent all but three of his twenty-two years in the major leagues with the Giants over two San Francisco stints.
The big left-handed swinger known as "Stretch" hit 521 homers over his career and might have easily hit 600, had he not played in such a power sapping stadium in Candlestick Park.
McCovey won the Rookie of the Year for 1959 and was the National League MVP in 1969, but might be best remembered for his vicious line drive smashed right at second baseman Bobby Richardson with runners at second and third in a 1-0 game for the Giants in game seven of the 1962 World Series.
McCovey would later say that ball was the hardest ball that he ever hit, but the ball was hit directly to Richardson, who grabbed it to end the series, which would be the only time that McCovey would play in a World Series. although he would play in the 1971 NLCS with the Giants losing to Pittsburgh.
McCovey entered the Hall in 1986.

My other McCovey memory comes from 1974, when McCovey was traded from the Giants to the Padres.
Topps baseball cards being unable to produce a Padres card in time, did one of their less than
wonderful airbrushing jobs on his cap with a crude SD design for his card, but there was more than just that for this card because this was the off-season that the Padres looked to be sold at press time and moved to Washington.
Topps tried to stem the tide a bit by releasing some of the Padres cards with the tag "Washington Nat'l Lea" and McCovey was one of those cards.
The 1974 McCovey "Nat'l Lea" card is a short print and is the one that has the most value due to his HOF status.
As for me in 1974, I spent a lot of time in Kindergarten, trying to figure out just what the hell "Washington Nat'l Lea" meant when by the time the cards were released, McDonald's owner Ray Kroc had bought the Padres, kept them in San Diego and made the Washington move one that wouldn't remembered hardly at all, if not for your friends at Topps.

Goodbye to another Hall of Famer, this time from the Football Hall as former Packers fullback Jim Taylor passed at the age of 83.
Taylor, who was the first of the Lombardi Packers to make the Hall in 1976, rushed for over 1,000 yards in five straight seasons from 1960-64 and won the league MVP in 1962 for the World Champion Packers.
Taylor was the pounding fullback in a backfield with finesse halfback Paul Hornung and was the runner that moved the chain as he averaged well over 200 carries a season for seven years.
Taylor was a member of the Packers first Super Bowl winning team, but not the second, as he used the seldom used "Option Rule" to become a free agent at the end of the 1966 season.
Taylor, who played his college football at LSU, signed with the brand new New Orleans Saints with four one year contracts,but would only play one less than productive season there.
The Packers received the Saints first round pick in 1968 as "compensation" and began the long road of the Saints trading high draft picks for washed up veterans which continued well in the 1980's.

Goodbye to Jack Patera, former NFL linebacker and the first coach of the Seattle Seahawks at the age of 85.
Patera, who played for the Colts, Chicago Cardinals and the expansion Dallas Cowboys in a seven year career, built his coaching resume by coaching two of the most famous defensive lines in NFL history in the Rams "Fearsome Foursome" and the Vikings "Purple People Eaters" before being hired to lead the expansion Seahawks.
Patera coached Seattle for their first six seasons before being fired two games into the 1982 season and had winning seasons in 1978 and 1979, but those teams were known best for the trick plays called by Patera and the scrambling and wild ways of left-handed quarterback Jim Zorn.
Patera never coached again after leaving Seattle.
Patera was also the older brother of 1972 Olympic weightlifter and pro wrestler Ken Patera.

Goodbye to "Doctor Z", Paul Zimmerman at the age of 86.
Zimmerman had struggled with health over the last ten years after a 2008 stroke that left him unable to speak and unable to continue writing for Sports Illustrated.
Zimmerman's writing for SI was way ahead of its time and he spent a few years on ESPN's early NFL Draft coverage.
Zimmerman was profiled by us as a Forgotten Superstar in 2013

I'm planning on a profile on a slow day for another recent passing- Wrestling's "Mr. Unpredictable" Dick Slater, who passed at 67 last month.