Back in the mid-80s, evil toy conglomerate 'LJN' sought to capitalize on the one children's sport nobody else ever thought they could profit from: thumb wrestling. Now I'm not sure if kids today have moved onto higher plateaus of dispute-settling hand wars, but I don't think a day went by in my childhood where I didn't thumb wrestle at least three or four people. We loved thumb wrestling! We breathed thumb wrestling! We would've eaten thumb wrestling had it been feasibly possible!
I found a loophole in the game that sometimes got me into trouble. As anyone who's played it knows, it's typical for one of the contestants to yell 'no sneak attacks!' before the round begins. This means you can't use other fingers aside from your fabled thumb. The way I pegged it, as long as I clearly announced my intentions, I was playing by the rules. I called it the 'blatant attack,' where my thumb's tag team partner (the thumb on my other hand) casually crushed all opponents midway through the match. It never went over well, and I received a lot of punches to the stomach as a direct result.
So, in theory, WWF Thumb Wrestlers were the opus tools in any finger battle. Pro-wrestling figures who fit over your thumb, allowing you to battle your opponent en route to victory. Here's how they were sold:
Each set came with two figures, and most of the popular wrestlers of the time were represented. Some of the collections came with highly sought characters, like the one pictured above with Hulk Hogan, and former adversary 'Big' John Studd. Not to be confused with 'Little' John Studd or 'Fun-Sized' John Studd. Some of the other sets had wrestlers no kid wanted. I'm pretty sure I would've survived adolescence just fine without a Tito Santana thumb wrestler, but I probably would've went down a dark path without the guiding light of my Junkyard Dog. Part of the thrill of watching wrestling, especially for kids back then, was choosing your favorites and arguing with friends over who was the best. If you managed to find your most cherished wrestler in one of these thumby figures, now you could just battle to prove your convictions.
The kids up above are reenacting a main event that used to make the world's collective giant mutant mouth water: Hulk Hogan versus 'Rowdy' Roddy Piper. A lot of the glory of wrestling toys was ridding yourselves of the substandard booking. Since Hogan won every match on every show in every history of every real and alternate universe, you finally found a way to make him lose. So what if the record books didn't log the results of thumb wrestling matches? We still know the truth - Roddy made Hulk his bitch. Partly because the Scottish are such dirty tricksters, but mostly because the kid on the left had arthritis from all those Nintendo afternoons.
Okay, I know what you're thinking. To the untrained eye and the unknowing soul, it looks like kids have their thumbs shoved up pro-wrestling's most popular asses. It wasn't like that, I swear. It's just visual trickery - here's how the mechanics really worked...
See? The thumb holes are actually located above the ass, not up it. Nothing sick about these toys. As an added bonus, kids who just wanted to use these toys as standard wrestling action figures could pretend that some were on the injured reserve list after having their spinal cords ripped out, hence the big gaping hole in the back.
By the way, the two pictured above are fairly historic. First we have my all-time favorite, Randy 'Macho Man' Savage. The several-time world champion became bigger than life after apparently signing his soul away to Slim Jim, whom he acts as a spokesperson for. How seriously did he take the job? Well, I distinctly remember one wrestling pay-per-view main event that Savage was co-headlining. As he walked down the aisle - something that's supposed to be an intense, serious moment in the main events - Randy grabs a Slim Jim out of a fan's hand, holds it up to the camera, and with all the professionalism and dedication he can muster, nails these immortal words: 'SNAP INTO IT!'
He didn't win the title that night, but he won the hearts of everyone who paid 39.95 to see a Slim Jim advertisement.
Iron Sheik, pictured on the right, is famous for being the guy Hulk Hogan defeated for his first world title. He's also famous for being the oldest, fattest crack addict still living today. In his defense, I'd probably go a little nuts too if I had to wear shoes with big vinyl horns on them for 20+ years.
The only thing I was never really able to figure out is how you're supposed to decide on a winner. It's pretty tough to hold down one of these figures for three seconds, especially if you're using the one finger on your hand covered with a Hillbilly Jim puppet. I guess you just wrestled till somebody got bored and forfeited the match. Fortunately, it usually didn't take very long. You'd be surprised at how quickly the novelty of mashing your fingers against someone else's fingers wears off. Especially when that nosy passerby keeps asking you why you're sticking your hand up Ricky Steamboat's rectum.
There's a battle for the ages - Junkyard Dog versus Nikolai Volkoff. JYD was really popular in his time, but Nikolai? C'mon, who in their right mind would agree to be Nikolai Volkoff? A fat, USA-hating slob who sings the Russian anthem before each match isn't exactly my first choice, but I guess they need some fall guys to make the heroes look better.
I think these kids are getting a little too obsessed with their wrestling finger-puppets. Bringing toys to school is a social no-no. Even back in 2nd or 3rd grade, it was common practice to pretend that you didn't own any toys within the confines of school grounds, because it made you look like a baby. Looking like a baby was really bad in grade school days, since you're just three steps away from nasty rumors about pants pissing, nose picking, and the end-all insult: breastfeeder.
It went in that order, too. Minor crimes nailed you as the type of kid who pissed themselves. Major infractions took it a bit higher - now you were a nose picker, which was somehow worse than the urine. But if you did something really stupid, pretty soon everyone in the school would start telling you to leave Mommy's tits alone. It was serious stuff, and a serious system.
Bringing wrestling toys to school would take you right to that last level. From where I sit, playing with Roddy Piper during lunchtime isn't worth having to constantly deal with the 'nipple lover' insults. Especially since I lost my Roddy Piper figure's removable kilt, rendering him completely worthless.
Whoa hey, it's him! It's the Iron Sheik! At school! With no shirt on! If he wasn't such a big star, I think the security team would've shot him on the spot. It's a good thing everyone remembered that killer match he had with 'Iron' Mike Sharpe in Tulsa back in 1982. Whew, dodged a bullet there.
What's he here for? Why, to tell you about LJN'S HOT NEW WWF THUMB WRESTLERS, of course! You know, utilizing the Iron Sheik as a spokesperson is admirable in it's unique style, but overall, it probably wasn't the best idea. I don't think there's a person in the world who's ever understood a single word the Iron Sheik has ever said. We just assumed he was one of the bad guys because he carried around that Iranian flag all the time. For all we really knew, he was telling us to brush regularly and to listen to our parents during in-ring promos.
So, when he waddles out to shill wrestling toys, he relies on sign language. Two thumbs up = buy thumb wrestlers. Two thumbs up + uncharacteristic smile = buy many thumb wrestlers. He's a poet without even speaking. I love the Iron Sheik.
And hey, kids love the guy too. Who wouldn't love a big naked bald monster from Iran who thinks tying tapestries around his legs worked great as pants? LJN's Thumb Wrestlers didn't last long on the store shelves, having come out at the tail end of the WWF's initial big boom. I'm pretty sure they ended up marketing these things again in the late 90s when wrestling's 'cool factor' returned, but by that point, I doubt we got a reissue of Nikolai or Don Muraco. Pity.
Just another look at a more innocent era in the world of pro-wrestling, back when parents didn't have to monitor which naked girl was shoving her tongue down the throat of another naked girl in the middle of what was supposed to be a steel cage match. Times were simpler, but they were still fun. Even though the quasi-sport has changed a lot in ways that sometimes turns off fans in droves, we'll always have the memories. And we'll always have the Iron Sheik.
Recent Wrasslin' Articles: Hulk Hogan's Workout Set - Hulk and Andre's Cereal Commercials
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