As a HUGE Fan of this It's hard to put into words what a great yet under rated taqlent he was. Later today I'll be posting a whole slew of stuff of Slater's, from all over the place so people can see how great he really was.
Born Richard Van Slater, Slater was best known for his runs in WCW and Georgia Championship Wrestling with plenty of stops in between.
A former football player and amateur wrestler, Slater began his career in 1972 in Florida under Mike Graham, trained by Bill Wats, Hiro Matsuda, Bob Roop, and Jack Brisco. He eventually found his way to GCW for an 11-year run, winning several singles and tag team titles. In the mid-80s, he worked for Mid-Atlantic Championship Wrestling, where he was was a wrestler and a booker, and Mid-South Wrestling.
After an uneventful one year run in WWF, he went to All Japan Pro Wrestling as mainly a tag team act before coming to WCW in 1989 where he'd stay until 1996 when a back injury ended his career. Again, he worked mainly in tag teams, working with Dick Murdoch, Dusty Rhodes, Terry Funk, The Great Muta, Greg Valentine, and Bunkhouse Buck, the latter of which earned him the Worst Tag Team award in the 1995 Wrestling Observer Newsletter awards.
He won a slew of NWA titles including the U.S. title, tag titles, and TV title among other regional belts.
In June 2004, Slater was convicted of attacking his former girlfriend with a butcher's knife and was sentenced to a year of house arrest and two years of probation.