Sunday, August 21, 2011

Vintage Beefcakes of Wrestling - Cowboy Bill Watts

Here's a photo from the match that turned me on to professional wrestling for life...













It shows Cowboy Bill Watts kneeling over Bruno Sammartino and, if I recall correctly, is from the late 1960s/early1970s. As a precocious youngster, I had an issue of Pro Wrestling Illustrated and these pictures of Bruno and Bill stirred something in me, something I could not identify till I reached my teens. What was it about the images of these two burly, barely-dressed he-men battling each other that was so fascinating to me?  Till this day, I still don't know how, at the tender age of 6 or 7, I became obsessed with wrestlers and wrestling. I'll admit that there were times in my life when I wished I could have been more "normal," but I've learned to accept my particular brand of "kink." So thanks Bruno and Cowboy Bill for making my life a little less ordinary.  Here are pics of Cowboy Bill at his prime; watch him in a 1965 match against Tomas Marin. If you would like to know what he's been up to these days, check out his website.










1 comment:

  1. Hi Bruno, thanks for sharing this ... that really is a helluva hot pic of Bill Watts lording over Sammartino... I have often found Bill Watts to be a example of the uber-wrestler and a huge turn on (recently read his autobiography) ...

    like yourself, it was a wrestling publication circa the mid-1970s that pushed me over the edge and into this kink ... it was an “Inside Wrestling” and the entire cover featured Sammartino down on one knee, holding the ropes to steady himself... the cover story was about how all his recent battles and “blood thirsty” foes was dragging him down... the photos of Sammartino inside were hot enough alright but their was an article on Nick Bockwinkle that clinched it for me ... big, burly and blond with a barrel chest and hairy gut ... I never got to see Bockwinkle wrestle until the AWA came to ESPN in the 1980s but that magazine that featured Sammartino and Bockwinkle in tights and boots, fighting against bigger bearish opponents was my "odd" porn of the day... and it’s a fetish I have not been able to shake ever since.

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