Sell him or bash him. Never really heard too much of the guy but he was around for quite a while from what i gather. Dont know too much about him to be honest but for some reason he intruges me and maybe he is a hidden gem guy. Probably not quite the level of a Murdoch or Butch Reed but if anyone cares to expand on him good or bad please do.

How much actual footage is out there of Slater? He does to me on the surface seem like the type of guy you know a lot about but then try to analyze and don't have many matches and stuff to go off of.

 

On the surface, I can say that I greatly enjoyed his match with Jumbo on the All Japan set.

Another guy who probably peaked in mid-south. Really enjoyed him there.

At times he really was too far on the Terry Funk clone side for me but overall he was a pretty solid kind of worker. He re-surfaced many times in WCW later on for short, nameless tag team stints (with Greg Valentine, Dick Murdoch, and.. gasp... Jimmy Golden too).

Pretty sure the team with Murdoch was known as "The Hardliners" or "The Two Dicks".

I only really know of his WCW stuff and yea he kind of does come off as a Terry clone but maybe that's what intruiged me about him i'm not sure. I've heard his Mid South stuff was pretty good though. Would you guys say he is on level with Mantell or a notch below?

He always seemed really bland to me, even in Mid South when other people liked him. But I watched his match in the USWA title tournament against Lawler recently and really enjoyed it, and he was past his prime by that point. So I might like Slater more watching the stuff again now.

At his best, he has some really great matches but the Terry Funk clone criticism is valid.

Really enjoyed his stuff in Mid-South with Jake Roberts for instance.

One should really not judge him on his WCW stuff (yeah, the Hardliners and succh) as he was way past his prime then.

I liked him Mid-South. His feud with Jake Roberts was really good . He can do a lot of stuff.For example he could work a brawl, also was adept at stooging for the baby face. I thought Mid-South was a territory that played to his skill set. I was kinda disappointed with the Butch Reed feud in Mid-South. It was at the bottom of liked matches in DVDVR voting if memory serves correctly.

I love Slater. He's been a favorite of mine since I saw him in Mid South back in the 80's. My favorite weird WTF? WWF gimmick involved him, as well. In 86 when people were leaving Watts in droves to go to WWF, Slater was brought in as "The Rebel" Dick Slater. He'd come down to the ring waving a huge Confederate flag....and he was a Babyface. Needless to say, it didn't get over in a WWF that was still Northeast based and was in the middle of the expansion.

The Funk clone stuff was really apparent toward the end of his career. He subbed for Funk at Clash 7 (plastic bag angle), he was brought into Studd Stable as Funk's replacement when Terry left WCW.

 

Any footage of his tag run with Orton in the Southeast out there. Cornette once claimed that the early Midnight Express double teams were stolen from Slater and Orton.

I like Slater, but Bob Orton is the kind of guy I could see watching fifty matches of for some short lived project in this forum.

I love Bob Orton Jr. Its a shame most people really only think of him as Piper's stooge with the cast on his arm. He was a phenomenal wrestler. I think he is one of the most underrated guys of all time. There is always theories as to who else was on this mythical list of possible NWA champs. Bob Orton would have been a great choice at some point. There is just very limited footage of him during his prime( which is probably 76-84) so we are just left with this image of him standing behind Piper for a couple of years.

Slater was and is a legend in the state of Georgia and his best work maybe ever is stuff that will never be seen and that was his work in GCW from about 76-78. I've always heard that he was at his peak then as a worker and character. He wasn't doing the Terry clone stuff and once he turned back babyface helping II he was like Stan Hansen in that they were babyfaces in Georgia forever except Hansen's run teaming with Ole. Slater would come in every year as a mystery partner or mystery opponent and would pop the Omni.

Slater was and is a legend in the state of Georgia and his best work maybe ever is stuff that will never be seen and that was his work in GCW from about 76-78. I've always heard that he was at his peak then as a worker and character. He wasn't doing the Terry clone stuff and once he turned back babyface helping II he was like Stan Hansen in that they were babyfaces in Georgia forever except Hansen's run teaming with Ole. Slater would come in every year as a mystery partner or mystery opponent and would pop the Omni.

 

Damn that sounds awesome. I love the old territory legends like that

About six years ago I rewatched a bunch of the J-Tex stuff. As a kid I watched J-Tex for Muta and Sawyer, on rewatch was surprised at how much Slater is the guy who holds the multimen matches together.

 

The 91 Slater/Murdoch team in WCW didn't last long (post WCW they have a couple Puerto Rican matches that are mostly built on heel stooging) but they did run a long Zbysco/Arn v Murdoch/Slater heel v heel tag where both teams got a heel in peril section. It's super fun match.

Tom,

 

What did that air on?

 

91-92 WCW is amazing for the sheer number of fun and random matches they just gave away on random TV shows.

Check out the YouTube videos called 1984 - A Year of Transition...you can see him as the main heel in Crockett for the first part of the year and he is pretty damn good, and I dont see a FUnk clone in him on that run....He has good matches with Flair and Greg Valenine (right before Greg left for WWF) and is trying to get every title. Also forms a small stable with Gary Hart / Ivan Koloff and another guy..

 

Here is part 1 of over 100 videos:

 

I enjoyed his UWF stuff quite a bit, so I'm curious how his Mid Atlantic run was as I've really enjoyed the small sample I have seen of it so far. I was surprised to hear on the Austin podcast that he was booking at some point.

I was just wondering the other day if Rough and Ready (Slater's last WCW team, with Mike Enos) had any good matches. Enos by himself had some terrific Nitro matches against Malenko and Jericho, but I don't remember anything about Rough and Ready other than loving their entrance music,

I was just wondering the other day if Rough and Ready (Slater's last WCW team, with Mike Enos) had any good matches. Enos by himself had some terrific Nitro matches against Malenko and Jericho, but I don't remember anything about Rough and Ready other than loving their entrance music,

 

Saw a decent Rough & Ready match with Harlem Heat of all people on Saturday Night 96.10.26. Enos did a few impressive power spots and Slater was… well, he was 1996 Slater.

Dick Slater vs. Greg Valentine (2/25/84)

 

This must be the semi final for the TV title. I've just watched Slater defeat Dory Funk Jr in the quarter. Was curious to see this one.

 

Greg goes straight for Slater with elbows. Slow armdrag and twist from Greg. Hammer blow. Bodyslam. Drops the leg on Slater's arm. Arm bar. Incidentally the other semi is Assassin #2 vs. Mark Youngblood (curiously under stacked side of the draw, compared with this side).

 

Gut punches by Slater. Gullotines Greg on top rope. Vertical suplex. Elbow drop. Nice one. Side Russian legsweep. Greg comes back. Blows back and forth now. Elbow smashes by Greg. Big knee drop. Nasty wishbone. Cover gets two only. Elbow. Stiff as hell. Headbutt by Slater. Inverted atomic drop by Greg. Second rope elbow. Slater rolls out of ring. Greg throw him back in. Slater tries to run. Hammer blow from Greg. Side suplex by Greg. Slater tries to work out again. Full Nelson on the outside. Back in. No, the bell has gone. Sly, Slater with the cheapest of the cheap count out wins.

 

This was a really heated ten-minute TV match. Stiff and intense, especially from Valentine. Worth a watch.

 

***

 

I might seek out some more Slater from this run, looks like he was getting a major push here.

Slater's probably the best part of 84 JCP, unless you're some goofball who would get a kick out of Dory in a mask.