From about 1989 to 1994, a California company known as Slammers Wrestling Federation produced pro wrestling video tapes you could order by mail. Did anybody else purchase these tapes? Some of their hottest wrestlers included Bill Pearl, Jeff Lindberg, Dynamite D, and a masked man named Hombre del Oro if those names ring any bells.
This was before BG East, before the Internet was a thing. How amazing, I thought when I learned of this company, that this stable of scantily clad young wrestlers were willing to strip down and perform my beloved pro wrestling moves for about $20 per tape!
Slammers‘ VHS tapes were packaged in a cardboard cover with a racy and enticing photo on it, such as this one featuring a blond “young lion” having his forehead bitten. By the way, I saw that this video was once for sale on Amazon, but it says the item is no longer available. Too bad.
So I was going through some old wrestling DVDs I keep in a box and discovered footage of Slammers matches that I had converted from VHS to DVD.
To pay tribute to Slammers, here are some images from one of their matches I had on tape which I also uploaded to YouTube.
Suni Strongbow was taught the art of suffering.
The long-haired Baby-Face in the red speedo is Suni (pronounced “Sunny”) Strongbow. I suppose his name refers to Native American wrestler Chief Jay Strongbow — but Suni is much more attractive than Chief Jay with that pretty long hair, lean body, and dangerously minimal trunks. He is a typical Slammers wrestler — smooth, lanky, and nearly naked.
Well cut it off if you don’t want opponents to slam your face by pulling it!
The beefy Heel in the black trunks is named El Toro Bravo (“Bravo” is also a well-known name in the pro wrestling universe, revealing that the brains behind Slammers knew and loved old-school rasslin’.)
El Toro was a trainer at Slammers I believe. His job was to kick all the pretty-boy wrestlers’ little asses and teach them how to suffer for us.
Slammers was filmed in front of a live studio audience containing about 40 people. They all had front-row seats because there was only one row of chairs around the ring. I always wondered how it was possible that these people did not seem to notice the homo-erotic posing and sexually charged antices happening right before their eyes??
There are no commentators calling the action, so every remark, insult, or cat-call by the audience can be heard on tape. Some woman, for example, keeps scolding El Toro for his cheating, which turned me on. Buy you never hear someone shouting the obvious: “Grab him by that big cock!” or something.
Mauled by “The Bull”
I was never quite sure how homo-erotic Slammers was meant to be… It was filmed in front of an audience that included children, so it couldn’t be too explicitly gay, right? But then their little skimpy trunks — those tight, revealing little nut-huggers they wore — the distributors had to know we were beating off to these tapes, right?!
I learned about Slammers Wrestling Federation from an ad I saw in the back of some muscle beefcake magazine one of my work-out buddies had in his house (not the specific magazine pictured here, but one like it). He was into working out and had stacks of these muscle mags. Maybe he jerked off to them, I don’t know (he’s married now.)
I never got too excited by these beefcake magazines — the bodies are almost too ripped for my tastes, and it’s not like they’re Body-Slamming or Suplexing each other. But then I stumbled upon the Slammers advertisement in the personals section at the back: just a few images and an order form and I was dizzy with excitement. I burned the address into my brain so I could send away for some tapes.
So was Slammers in fact an early example of wrestle porn, a pioneer in the Homo-erotic Beat-Off Video Industry which is a growing by leaps and bounds? We know that Slammers advertised in the personals section of beefcake magazines, which were perhaps targeted to a gay audience. Did the Slammers advertising department envision the gay readers of these muscle mags getting all worked up by the beefcake photos and then stumbling upon their order form at the back of the magazine like dogs in heat?
Slammers shipped their tapes in plain manila envelopes which was exactly how pornography was sent in those days to avoid offending the mail carrier. And their videos featured a batch of fit, attractive, smooth young athletes (or models?) dressed in basically speedo bathing suits. So Slammers’ videos were meant to be soft-core gay pornography, right? If my body’s reaction to the performances is any indication, then the answer is YES.
They MUST know we get off on hair-pulling because El Toro is fucking relentless!
I remember I was an adult living at home with my parents at the time, so I was nervous about having these sketchy videos shipped to my house. Surely they would see these mysterious packages arriving in the mail and ask questions or worry about me. But I had to have these videos! Hopefully I could beat my parents to the mailbox and sneak the envelope into my room. It was worth the risk, I needed pro wrestling so bad.
You never saw THAT on WWF or WCW!
The most graphic and memorable scene in the match occurs when El Toro bites his opponent’s bare foot! Yuck! I know plenty of my readers are into barefooted wrestlers (not really my thing) and are losing it over this grotesque, kinky, sadistic move. Surely the producers knew THIS sort of wrestling would sell more videos to a certain demographic of viewers, right?
Slammers Wrestling Federation was basic, straight-forward pro wrestling performed by lean, attractive young studs in remarkably tight speedos. You knew that these lads were too skinny to become real pro wrestlers, especially in that era of bulk and brawn, so they were basically just playing grab-ass in hot gear while being filmed for our viewing pleasure.
The action was innocent enough for the customer to claim: “No mom and dad, I just enjoy the athleticism and sport. I am inspired by their health and fitness.”