This past weekend, I enjoyed participating in my second WrestleFest gathering, and my first in New York. It was intense and fun and, not unlike my experience of NYC itself, dozens of different things at the same time. My first adventure to a WrestleFest was last summer, when I thoroughly enjoyed attending WrestleFest Canada. In Toronto, everyone I met I was meeting for the first time. This past weekend felt more like a reunion, catching up with old friends. Well, maybe less like a reunion and more like going back to summer camp to rekindle friendships forged in the intensity of periodical pop-up community. Well, summer camp in Manhattan… with snow falling… in mid-February. Okay, okay, metaphors fail me. It was awesome. I’ll just start there.
I squeezed in a healthy amount of hot wrestling action, I’m happy to report. As in Toronto, I got to enjoy some group scraps and several 1-on-1 matches. In the weeks leading up to WrestleFest, I actually dabbled with the idea of just scheduling matches with wrestlers I’d already matched with, and enjoyed so much, last summer. But the opportunity to wrestle some guys I’d never met in person sort of fell into my lap (in one case, quite literally). Wrestling with new faces turned up that intensity of trying to anticipate the unknown. I’d have had a blast if I’d only wrestled with friends I already knew I was going to have a great time with, but there’s definitely value added in that nervous lead up to the knock at the door, and the reveal of finding out how well the wrestler on the other side of the door matches his MF picture and, more importantly, my mental picture of what it would be like to lock up with the hottie with whom I’ve been exchanging messages and negotiating what to expect of each other. I sincerely hope that my new-to-me opponents this past weekend go into the looking-forward-to-the-rematch column for the next time. They were hot, sweaty, and exhausting times with genuinely fascinating and incredibly sexy guys. My first-time opponents were snarky fun and funny and all had a similar laid back vibe that really resonated with me this weekend.
Opportunities to rematch and reconnect with former opponents/pals was, of course, a major highlight. I got to tussle with SeattleFight and my buddy Bobby again. I thoroughly enjoyed another round with one of my coaches from WrestleFest Canada, TxWresl, who generously assured me that I’ve improved since last August. And I got to go a few entirely unexpected rounds with Scott Williams, who I knew was going to be attending WrestleFest, but with whom I hadn’t managed to actually schedule a match ahead of time. I was less inhibited and less in my own head in these rematches. Knowing a little bit about what to expect, and what was expected of me, let me jump into the middle of the intensity of a match right from the start. With familiar opponents, I spent less time battling my insecurities, less time wondering if I was as skilled as they’d hoped, as attractive as they’d hoped, as competitive as they’d hoped, as I am when squaring off against new opponents. The rematches are sort of a blur to me because they all felt like one furiously intense chapter in a much longer story, and I love that.
I was humbled many times this weekend by blog readers coming up to introduce themselves and offer praise and encouragement for this labor of love I’ve been typing away at for almost 15 years (I just double checked… my first post was May 15, 2009… someone bake me a cake in May). It’s sort of stunning and surreal to hear guys say how meaningful my seemingly aimless ramblings have been to them, often as an early point of contact with homoerotic wrestling community. Like, woah. A few guys this weekend described discovering for the first time that there are others with an erotic interest in wrestling by stumbling across my words here on the blog, and then fast forward to 2024, and those guys are in Manhattan with 300 other like-minded guys celebrating homoerotic wrestling in person. Amazing! Humbling. Like, fuck, I need to go back and edit all of my old blog posts for the infinite typographical and grammatical errors I keep piling onto these pages and making myself cringe when I re-read them, considering this is seriously formative stuff for some of you!
All joking aside (well, some of the joking aside), my first and biggest impression of Wrestlefest NYC 2024 as I try to digest it all these few days later is community. It was about relationships, new and continuing. It was about more than just not being alone, but being part of something that feels vital and grounding and connected to something I know is deeply true in me. It was all about that knowing grin we share when we recognize that same thing that’s inside me is also inside you, and even if it isn’t something we talk about with just anybody in our lives, for this one moment at this event, it’s right there, out in the open, connecting us to one another.
I’ve got more to say, but just wanted to start there in downloading and debriefing this past weekend. WrestleFest NYC was plugging into community that I didn’t always know existed, but now can’t imagine my place in the world without being part of it.
If you’ve read my posts from last summer about my experiences at Wrestlefest Canada, it’ll come as no surprise that I’ve been keenly interested in seeing if I can make it to Wrestlefest NYC this year. It took me a while to sort out the details, but I’m excited to report that this coming weekend, I’ll be in NYC for the much-anticipated event. “Much-anticipated” is sort of understatement, really. There are several hundreds of guys confirmed coming this year, by all accounts blowing out the previous attendance record by a mile (or approximately 1.6 km for those of you coming from out of the country). The exact count is nebulous. Out of the “raw” list of confirmations on MeetFighters, looks like about 210 or so of them have confirmed on the Wrestlefest Discord server. And then there’s an alternatively organized Wrestlefest happening that overlaps, but not exactly, with the event starting this weekend with its own roster. And then there are a ton of local NYC Meetfighters who are apparently setting up matches with attendees, but not necessarily signing up themselves. There’s a ton of energy and what feels like good will and excitement bubbling up in the chats, though.
Something new this year is an expanded list of social events and organized wrestling meet-ups that my friend Scooter has been working on for literally over a year. Local venues seem excited to welcome Wrestlefest attendees, such as the Stonewall Inn hosting the Wrestlefest kick-off party on Friday night, followed by public oil wrestling at the Rock Bar later on that night. There are too many organized events and group wrestling meet-ups to mention here, but the Wrestlefest NYC website has an awesome list, if you’re interested. One of those events is of particular interest to me, because I’ll be directly involved.
Sunday afternoon, I’ll be moderating a Gay Wrestling History panel discussion and Q&A session with BG East wrestlers. I know what you’re thinking, because I’m thinking the same thing. Has there EVER been a more perfect job for me!?!? Organizing the event, it started off as an opportunity to hear insights from guys who’ve been wrestling in the community and building the community into what it is, for decades. This is the 20th anniversary of Wrestlefest NYC, and the 45 anniversary of BG East, and we’ve come a long, loooooong way to get the point where 200 or 300 (or more) guys from all over the world are showing up to wrestle and celebrate our shared passion for all things gay wrestling-related. When I say they’re coming from all over the world, I mean it literally. I know for a fact there are wrestlers from Italy, Germany, Mexico, France, the UK, and elsewhere setting up matches for the fest.
I think it’s super easy to celebrate this momentum as if its something new and novel. But having the biggest Wrestlefest NYC in history, and even having the first WFNYC 20 years ago, happens because of wrestlers 30, 40, and 50 years ago cobbling together connections and being brave enough to build the foundations of a community in a very different social climate. Tech like MeetFighters (emerging after Global Fight and Yahoo chat rooms and AOL chat rooms) has definitely revolutionized ways that a community like this can grow, but the community was growing long before any of us were nervously lurking in AOL chat rooms wondering if its safe enough to speak up about anything gay-related. Who we are today, and what we’re able to celebrate so remarkably openly in NYC this weekend, are built on foundations that were being laid long before most of us ever imagined something like a 300+ person gathering of guys enjoying homoerotic wrestling. Community has been gathering in lots of different places, in different formats and configurations, and those iterations shape who and what we are when we gather together this weekend in NYC.
Anyway, that panel is going to ROCK! So much of the history traces its way in and out of homoerotic wrestling videos, so many of the panelists also happen to be wrestling stars that I’ve fanboyed over and written extensively about for the past almost 15 years here on the blog. We originally rented a room with a capacity for 60 folks to gather together for the panel. We marketed it to the quickly growing Wrestelfest attendees list, and we very quickly had a waiting list. And we were hearing from attendees super excited for historical insights and stories, as well as fellow fanboys like me wanting some star sightings of our favorite BG East wrestlers. So, this weekend, we secured a larger space and doubled the available tickets. Within two days, we already have 86 seats reserved, and just 34 or so left up for grabs. I won’t be surprised if we max out the full 120 capacity by Sunday!
Because it’s BG East’s 45th anniversary, and because so many BG East stars were already involved with the history panel and even more were planning to attend the event, we’ve also organized a Q&A session with BG East wrestlers who’ll be there. I’m moderating that part of the event as well, and I alternate back and forth between thinking to myself that this is the most blazingly hot fantasy come true for me, and then thinking “what the fuck have I got myself into!?” The list of wrestlers is still coming together, but there are hot hunks who were there 45 years ago, as well as hot hunks who’ve shown up on our screens and in our fantasies all along the way through to today. I’ll be taking written questions from the audience to pose to the wrestlers in attendance, so comment below if you’re interested in me posing a question you have. Or, even better, if you’re in NYC on Sunday and want to join us, you can reserve your ticket (they’re free but mandatory) and join us! But do it fast before all the tickets are gone. And if you read the blog, say hey to me, because I blog for positive reinforcement.
My friend AR and I have spent a ton of time over the past year and a half exploring homoerotic wrestling fantasies in graphic and written form. AR is pathologically unassuming and humble, but he gets 100% of the credit for getting me back to enjoying writing homoerotic wrestling fiction. After publishing original stories for several years over a decade ago, I took a break from it and just never got back to it until AR invited me to work on projects together. The solitary nature of writing, and only inconsistently getting feedback that anyone was reading it (much less enjoying it) wasn’t reinforcing enough to keep my head in it. But with AR’s enthusiasm for it and the immediate reinforcement from our joint writing sessions, I’m enjoying the writing process more than ever before.
Pretty early on in our writing collaboration, we crafted an original character named Will Strong that we keep coming back to, again and again. Will is a hot, young muscle jock who, while on vacation in South Florida, finds himself recruited to audition for BG East. He’s naturally athletic, with a hot bod (of course) and a naive, earnest ambition to live out a pro wrestling dream he’s secretly nurtured since watching mainstream pro on TV as a kid (how many of us can identify with that?!). The first thing AR and I wrote about Will was a tag team match he wrestled with a certain homoerotic wrestling blogger, living out his homoerotic wrestling dream he’s secretly nurtured since watching BG East wrestling as a young adult (see the parallels?… we’re subtle). But we keep circling back to track Will Strong’s journey as a BG East rookie, in part because he’s hot and sexy and sensationally provocative heel bait. But he also has become a device to explore the behind-the-scenes as well as on-camera drama we enjoy imagining fueling the feuds and fires that both AR and I have long found so entertaining in BG East’s catalog. The more we write Will, the more 3D he and our BG East fantasyverse become, and it’s turning me on and tuning me into so much of what this entire blog is about.
So, I’ve started an anthology collection of the Will Strong journey that AR and I have been writing, that we’re eager to share with you. After that initial tag team match we wrote, we actually wrote a couple of prequels to explore Will’s origin story. I posted the first piece of the collection, “Discovering Will,” several months ago. We now have, no shit, more than a dozen more complete stories tracing Will’s footsteps deeper and deeper down the rabbit hole as a BG East fantasyverse rookie, caught up in the Boss’ diabolical schemes and squarely stuck in the sights of hungry heels who want a piece of what Will brings to the homoerotic wrestling ring.
In this first installment of Wednesday’s with Will here on the blog, I invite you to take a look at “Discovering Will,” the very beginning of Will’s journey. The plan is to start posting subsequent stories each week, in chronological order of Will’s path through the looking glass, to share with fans of homoerotic wrestling fiction what AR and I have been up to. And as an added bonus, you get to check out the dizzying, hot, intensely sexy 3D artwork AR produces to illustrate each title.
BG East’s Jesse Suave wrestles Will Strong in Florida Fights 12
Check out the excerpt below from Will’s BG East audition, facing ripped bodybuilder beauty Jesse Suave. They’re both getting their strings pulled by the Boss, KL, all in pursuit of the hottest homoerotic wrestling combat that fans want to see. Read the full story of “Discovering Will” here, and check out the anthology page in the coming weeks, as we track Will Strong’s descent into increasingly brutal stakes and his totally unexpected erotic self-discovery:
With a proud grin, Will let go and backed up, letting his opponent out of the corner. Furiously, Jesse lunged forward and landed a cracking slap across the stunned rookie’s face. Completely out of reflex, Will pulled back and pounded the palm of his hand across the chiseled left cheek of his opponent in retribution.
The violent slap spun Jesse around, dazed and clutching his throbbing face. Before he realized what was happening, he felt the Canadian’s strong arms shoved underneath his armpits. Will’s fingers laced together at the back of Jesse’s head as he locked down a full nelson, just like the muscle pros he cheered for on TV.
Jesse gasped at the power pressing his head forward and yanking his shoulders out of joint. His chiseled chin dug into his chest, as Will leaned back and lifted him dancing on his toes. An involuntary whimper slipped from the back of his throat, tears stinging his eyes.
“Am I doing this right,” Will asked with a smirk. “Is this the way this works?” He flexed hard and shook the straining hunk in his arms. Hot sweat made their bodies slide across one another, as Jesse squirmed against his restraints.
The Boss laughed loudly. “Trust me, kid, you’re doing great. Keep it up!”
The proud grin on Will’s face started to disappear when the stunningly strong fitness model in his arms began to flex, pressing his arms downward. He tried to double down on the full nelson, desperately digging his fingertips into the back of Jesse’s head. But the steady, powerful flex of the muscle hunk in his arms, accompanied by the feral growl snarling deep in Jesse’s chest, began to pry Will’s fingers apart.
Sweat continued to make their flexing muscles slick. With a sudden grunt, Jesse pumped his arms and pecs still harder, suddenly popping apart Will’s hands. With another snarling flex, Jesse shoved his arms down, making Will’s eyes grow wide with surprise at his shocking show of power.
Smoothly, Jesse reached over his shoulder with his right hand and grabbed hold of the back of his opponent’s head. Dropping to one knee, he pulled Will forward, flipping the rookie head-over-heels. Will bounced hard on his tailbone as he came to rest on his ass. Jesse’s right knee immediately pressed painfully into his spine, as the Canadian’s chin was held tightly in his opponent’s hands. An involuntary gasp of pain escaped from his gaping mouth as Jesse yanked backward on the chinlock, brutally bending his backbone across his knee and applying dizzying pressure on Will’s straining neck.
In the past, I’ve talked with more than one on-camera wrestler who’s described their strong ambivalence about the year-end award seasons. From a fan perspective, it’s all fun and games, speculating on our favorites and comparing our picks with the the average votes of other fans. I imagine from a company’s perspective, it’s just good marketing, drumming up attention on the catalogs they’ve logged over the previous 12 months and maybe giving a little extra sales push from the attention. And I’ve heard wrestlers sincerely excited to be nominated, enjoying the love sent their way whether they win or lose. But I’ve understood the sentiment when wrestlers have described how it can be actively invalidating at times. Like, maybe they were so proud of a particular match that they starred in, but it wasn’t even nominated. Or they worked so fucking hard for months in a caloric deficit to make those abs pop, but didn’t get a mention. Honestly, the LAST thing I want is for a hot, eager homoerotic wrestler to feel invalidated for putting themselves out there. That’s the opposite of what this blog is about. Let’s all normalize the celebration of all sexy wrestlers following their passions on camera for our enjoyment!
That said, I still find myself getting swept up in the awards season hoopla. Jakob commented here a few weeks ago that he’d like to hear my personal picks, just in case my tastes might direct his attention somewhere fun. That seems cool to me and, hopefully, in the spirit of validating the beauty and art of homoerotic wrestling. So, I’ll reflect a little on the nominees and winners of the BG East Besties, and weigh in with any additional nominees I’d like to add, in the spirit of hopefully reinforcing more of my favorite wrestling hunks to keep going at it.
Ruff ‘n’ Raunchy 7
The slate of Sexiest Match nominees was super competitive, so kudos to the nominating committee (yeah, yeah, I’m on the committee)! And, honestly, the fan favorite winner, X-Fights 58: Dio Characi vs. Kayden Keller, was my pick. But if you’re looking for top tier sexy fucking wrestling, all of the nominees are golden. Wrestle Worship 5 was also on my short list. Mat Scraps 4 makes me salivate like Pavlov’s dog just thinking about it. Into burly bear daddies beating the living fuck out of hardbodied twinks? Dive into X-Fights 58 match 1. Really, anything with Dio and/or Forrest in it. Or Zach. The only match from my short list that didn’t get into the nominations was Ruff ‘n’ Raunchy 7 with debuting Zach Ramos burning down the house against rising erotic muscle heel Gabe Steel.
Undagear 37
Best Mat Battle nominees also strong, though there were so many hot and hard fought mat battles this year. My top pick was Mickey and Forrest in Undagear 37, which was nominated but didn’t get the fan vote. Fuck, the intensity in that match made me felt like I was the one taking all those vicious slaps to the face! I also had Mat Scraps 4, because… see my comments above regarding anything with Dio and/or Forrest.
All hail The Comeback!
Best Ring Match was a foregone conclusion for me, and apparently for the majority of voters. Anything that starts with “welcome Brad Rochelle back to the ring” was destined to make me lose several loads. The Comeback 3 might have been competitive for that reason alone, but fuck no, Brad, Jonny, and debuting Kal Connors all three made that match crazy hot, hilarious, and flinch-worthy vicious! My short list also had the Hunkbash 29 tag team of Firestorm/Steel vs. rookies Vigo/Angeles, because it was so unexpectedly off the rails spontaneous and messy. Like, so fucking fiercely messy, I couldn’t take my eyes off of it. And by “it” I mean more than just Vinny’s ass. But… yeah, Vinny’s ass. But again, I’ve got nothing but love for all of the nominees. Any other year, and any of them could’ve owned the crown. But “welcome Brad Rochelle back to the ring” is the anthem of 2023, as far as I’m concerned.
Kal Connor
For Best Body, here’s particularly where I don’t want anyone to feel invalidated, because the quality of hot bodies on camera in 2023 was just so insanely high. Last year’s winner and my pick again was Dio, but newcomer Kal Connor stole the title from him. And fuck, Kal… yep, a fucking stunningly crafted body, particularly for the fitness and aesthetics. Like, Kal beating out Monstah Mike (runner up) sort of sums up the quandry of a contest like this. Just two completely different physiques, both jaw droppingly hot, both get me hard the instant I see them, both the product of a genetic lottery and a whole lot of hard fucking work. Tanner, Tony, Vinny… the also-rans are all deleriously sexy hot bodied hunks. I nominated Tony and Vinny, in addition to Dio. But honestly, if we accept that differently built bodies make equally legitimate claims to be best, I’d add Forrest, Jesse, Hayden, Jason/George, Paris. All you boys who’ve got the balls to stare the camera in the eye and flash those double biceps wearing nothing left to the imagination… you ALL rock me hard.
Brendan Byers
The Top Heel category brings up a little controversy for me. The title officially switched hands after Kayden owned it for the better part of the past decade. It returned to the hands of former winner and institution, Jonny, so that makes sense. At the risk of bumping into Kayden or Jonny sometime and getting my ass kicked, I have to say that I nominated and voted for Brendan. Kayden’s loss to Ace Aarons in Ruff ‘n’ Raunchy 7 honestly shook me out of Kayden’s corner. That match still sort of haunts me for the drama and the seriously weird dynamics of the heel-on-heel story. Nobody on the list is undeserving, but I’m honestly keying in lately more to the likes of Brendan and Mike.
Lobo Gris
Dio Characi, repeated for Top Babyface. When you look up babyface in the dictionary, it should have his picture. I think every match description I’ve written for him and every review I’ve done has used the word “cherubic.” Fuck… again, see my comments above about anything Dio floating my boat. Sunny DeLeon also just embodies that babyface vibe. Honestly, though, I actually nominated Lobo Gris, Damian Pike, and Kal Connor. Though Damian didn’t make it to the ballot, I stand by him deserving the nod. Runner-up Jason/George didn’t even occur to me, not because he’s not devastatingly handsome, but just because he has a “fuck you” edge to him that makes me not think of him quite as a babyface. But again, all good, particularly if we add Damian…. and Mickey.
Forrest Taylor
Forrest as Jobber of the Year again just fits. Dude has a corner on the market of pissing off heels in just the right way to get his SENSATIONAL ass (more on that in a moment) kicked harder and harder. He was my pick, and my nominee Freddy also got to the ballot. My other nominee was Kal, who didn’t get to the category, probably because we’re all still trying to peg exactly what role he inhabits most naturally in the BGE universe. Runner-Up Tanner is a sensational sufferer, of course. Damian is totally worthy. Hayden was a steller muscle jobber, but he was in only one match, his debut, late in the year, so I feel like timing was just off for him.
Mickey Knoxx
Debut of the Year went to Kal, who wasn’t even on my shortlist, but not because he doesn’t deserve the accolade. I just felt he also showed up pretty late in the year, giving us only a couple of glimpses, which isn’t his fault, but it did make me settle my nominations and vote elsewhere. Mickey Knoxx was, hands down, my pick for this category. I cannnot get enough of him ever since I caught his debut, and he’s kept coming in his rookie year showing something new and intense and fucking SEXY every time out of the gate. Really, same for my second place pick of Zach Ramos. I nominated Tony for this category because I could only nominate three, and I literally flipped a coin between Vinny and Tony for that third spot. Didn’t matter, though, because he didn’t make the slate. But I felt like, again, he just did more and showed more than, say, Ronin or Hayden did. Every one of them, including Tony and Vinny, were a sensational bench of rookies this year, though. No complaints from me, to be honest.
Jason Aleqsander
Now with the body part categories, see my comments above about celebrating EVERYONE. Voters picked Kal for best abs. The stunningly pretty boy probably hasn’t had a carb in years to craft that 6-pack, so of course that makes sense. And runner up Rocky… same. I actually voted for Jason/George because his abs just scream to me for someone to pound on them, which opponents almost always do, and his gut is a wall of muscle in a way that doesn’t show up quite like the classic 6-pack. Same for Dio, really… I really want to do a body shot off of his beautiful abs. Hayden and Vinny… totally. Either of them could show up and OWN this house based on the raw material.
Brendan Byers’ bulge
The Best Bulge vote is always super personal, right? I didn’t even nominate Dio, but please, do, give him any award, because that Brazilian god is fucking priceless. I’m not even really sure what I’m looking for in a nominee for Best Bulge anymore, without Mr. Joshua or Pete Sharp in the mix. I nominated Brendan and Zach because I’ve fixated on their bulges this year, but neither of them got to the slate. Happy to celebrate runner-up Forrest’s bulge (and ANYTHING else we want to celebrate about him… see my several comments above about him and Dio owning it). And totally, Ash, Ace, Tanner, Kal… nice bulges, hotties! Kal’s peekabo wardrobe malfunction (<–credit there to my buddy AR who I first heard refer to Kal’s balls popping out in Comeback that way) was another sexy moment that made 2023 quite memorable for me. Honestly, though, all bulges are perfect, in my book, when they’re attached to a fierce grappling hunk.
Mickey Knoxx’ ass
And then there’s the Best Butt category. Winner Monstah Mike was third on my shortlist, so no real complaints there. Him shoving Brendan’s face between those monstrously massive cheeks sort of drove home just what an awesome claim he has on that title. And before I bitch, let me just say I am such a huge fan of all of the other nominees on the list. Now I’ve gotten that out of the way… WHAT… THE… FUCK with the omission of Mickey Knoxx and Forrest Taylor’s DAZZLINGLY sexy glutes!? Honestly, in my mind, I just kept going back to Mickey and Forrest’s match in Undagear 37 to try to decide which ass I crushed on hardest. It was Mickey’s, by the way. But more to the point, neither of these guys even hit the slate!?!? This is not the first time this category has born my wrath. This is one of those moments where I turn into a raving fanatic who CANNOT see how my infatuations (Mickey and Forrest’s asses) objectively were overlooked for this category. Someone’s thumb was on this scale. I call for an official inquiry. I call shenanigans, damn it!!!!!
Undagear 37
Now that I’ve gotten that out of my system, I can be more magnanimous with the last of the categories I wanted to send up. Hottest Liplock… see my half a dozen comments above about Dio and Forrest. I actually give my vote to Forrest and Mickey’s angry hot liplock in Undagear 37, but it’s a toss up among so many scorching hot kisses. Personally, I put Zach and Lobo’s HUNGRY face sucking in second place from Florida Fights 11, but it just goes to show how hard it can be to compare different styles and tones of liplocks. All awesome nominees. All hail Dio and Kayden for a well deserved victory!
Any of you hot, hardworking wrestlers that didn’t get a nomination or were nominated, but didn’t win… I see you. You’re fucking sensational, just the way you are. This little awards exercise is all about us and our whims and peculiarities, and marketing, and not about what fucking sensationally sexy, gorgeous, courageous, fierce, and fabulous athletes you are. If you ever need a little validation, hit me up. I will tell it to you straight (well…. you know what I mean), and I can guarantee you, I think you’re a fucking star!
This has been a year and a half… maybe two… squeezed into one! Maybe I was making up for what was put on hold due to the pandemic? Or is this what a homoerotic wrestling fan mid-life crisis looks like? “Crisis” doesn’t really fit how this year landed for me, though. It was all good. It was relentlessly exiting and fun and validating.
Coming in 2024 – The Adventures of Will Strong, BG East Rookie (fantasy fan fiction by me and AR, amazing artwork by AR!)
Plugging away at this blog has been a mostly solitary endeavor over the past 14 years. I’m sure that’s one reason why I’ve always enjoyed so much doing interviews. For the most part, though, this is me dictating my inner monologue to a virtual/theoretical audience that I never meet in person. But 2023 was all about community. It was about exploring and enjoying all aspects of homoerotic wrestling with so many like-minded wrestling fans. Last year around this time, I was marveling at having made a new online friend in 2022, AR. My creative collaborations with AR grew more extensive and intense in 2023. He and I have explored so many hot wrestling fantasies through our text and his artwork, it’s a little difficult to describe just how productive we’ve been this year! I posted a few of our completed projects over the past several months, but that’s been just the tip of the iceberg. I’ve got more of our finished works in the queue to share with you all in 2024, but it’s been the process, not the product, that’s made creating with AR such a fun. We almost, but didn’t quite manage to meet up in person, but our time spent collaborating online was intense, hilarious, and one of the hottest celebrations of homoerotic wrestling in a year packed with celebrations.
AR also offered a ton of invaluable moral support as I prepped at the beginning of 2023 for my most anticipated adventure, wrestling Scott Williams. Well, AR’s moral support was of the harsh “you’d better work out more or Scott’s going to kick your ass” variety. I accused AR, at one point, of being on Scott’s payroll to keep me questioning if I’m ready for this. And, based on Scott’s bluster and trash talk in the comments here on the blog, I was excitedly anticipating a serious challenge from the hot hunk who I’ve been calling the “man of my dreams” for years. Last summer, after so much back and forth, so many threats and promises, I answered a knock at the door to find none other than the man of my dreams there, an actual homoerotic wrestling fantasy materializing in the (hot) flesh. The journey from discovering Scott starring in his BG East matches years ago, to blogging about how remarkably he pushes my buttons watching him wrestle, to interacting with him in the comments on the blog, to actually wrestling him, was almost surreal, and most certainly one of the standout highlights of 2023!
Related to prepping for that wrestling fantasy-come-true with Scott, 2023 also marked my venturing into meet up wrestling with others. There were a lot of factors that propelled me to explore meet-up wrestling. I first got connected with my friend/long lost cousin Scooter at the beginning of the year, when he reached out and asked if I’d help spread the word about the Beer Blast social event at Wrestlefest NYC in February. It was largely Scooter’s encouragement that prompted me not only to try meet-up wrestling for the first time, but to jump right into the deep end by attending Wrestlefest Canada in Toronto in July. And I’ve had so many amazing in-person connections, both on the mats and off, with dozens of incredibly cool wrestlers and wrestling fans. In Toronto, I got to fanboy all over Ben Monaco, Masked Menace, and Ollie Watts at the socials. I developed a friendship with BobbyBenCarter on Discord, then wrestled him in Toronto, then got together with him over dinner this fall when I was out of town at a conference. At Wrestlefest Canada, I got some amazingly generous wrestling lessons from stone cold hotties like TxWresl and Mattz4Fun, and have enjoyed staying connected with them since, because they’re just cool guys I like. I clicked so hard in an unscheduled match with SeattleFight that we just kept wrestling again and again that week in Toronto, and, similarly, have stayed in touch ever since. One of the wild aspects of this part of my adventure in 2023 was encountering a ton of blog readers who seemed excited to meet me in person. I felt like a legit celebrity at times, with total strangers knowing a lot about me solely from reading me. Lest I think too much of my celebrity status, there were also plenty of guys I met at Wrestlefest Canada who’d never heard of the blog and were clearly unimpressed if it came up in conversation. But just discovering the reach of the blog, outside the scope of my own head and into the awareness of guys from around the world with similar interests in homoerotic wrestling, really blew my mind.
I didn’t blog about it, but it was definitely a highlight of my year offline to get to reconnect in person with the Boss and the sexy captains of the homoerotic wrestling video industry at BG East. We met over lunch a few months ago, when Scooter was in town to talk Wrestlefest business with them, and I was reminded again of how much I understand about myself and what turns me on about wrestling that I owe to their world building and influence.
I’ve renegotiated my relationship with social media a few times over the past couple of years, and in 2023, I found a virtual community that’s been more positive and validating than just about any other I’ve tried. The Discord server created by my cuz Scooter, called the Wrestle Shack (in a self-conscious send up to BGE), has been a constructive and supportive point of contact with homoerotic wrestling fans and wrestlers from all over the world. It’s got a much more explicit and open vibe than the corners of mainstream social media I’ve seen carved out for us, and it’s more playful, body-positive, and explicitly validating of the diversity of guys into homoerotic wrestling than I’ve encountered pretty much anywhere else.
My unsolicited advice to homoerotic wrestling fans for the coming year is build your community. I’m sure it’ll look different for each of us, but find someone to share your wrestling imagination with like I’ve found with AR. Find friends who will make you feel good about yourself and encourage you to live your truth, like my buddies in the Wrestle Shack. If you’re into it, find some sexy wrestlers who are excited to explore with you the sensationally hot pleasures of wrestling, who respect your boundaries and are eager to find the ways that your pleasure and theirs line up. Hell, I really wish for you all to find someone who looks at you the way Scott looks at me when his head is trapped in my scissors, his face turning beet red, all of his hot, hard earned muscles just not enough to make his escape, and he sighs that deep, ragged sigh of resignation before bitterly tapping out, swearing, again, that it’ll never happen again.
Here’s to many more adventures in 2024 for all of us!
I have on more review in the queue for the year-end releases, but I think this will be my final review to post this year. And fuck, Mickey Knoxx and Forrest Taylor’sUndagear 37 match is the cream of the 2023 crop! I knew I was going to be all over this pairing. I’ve spent a LOT of time in 2023 adoring them separately, so I was anxiously anticipating this release since I first got wind of it. My expectations were high, and the heat and sweat and intensity of this match exceeds them.
There are a few “themes” to this match that will speak to different kinks, I imagine. The most explicit theme is tickling. Personally, I have a complicated relationship to tickling that dates back to being held down by my big brother as a kid and tickle-tortured. That’s the vibe, right there, when Mickey’s hands stray from his sweetly sexy, generous massage of Forrest’s back to tauntingly tickle the red-headed lumberjack’s sides. Turns out both of these wrestlers are ticklish, and the difference between their groaning, writhing sell of wrestling punishment in contrast to their frantic flopping, kicking, yelping scramble when they’re tickled, leaves me thinking that, no shit, these sexy boys are legitimately ticklish. From start to finish, there’s this intense bully-tickle theme, as both beauties work to lock each other down so tightly that they can torment each other with their sadistically dancing fingers across their feet, sides, and armpits. The desperation in both of them, as they fight 3.5 times as hard to flail and flop free from their tickling predicament than they do the straightforward wrestling punishment, takes me right back to that tormented, bitterly and involuntary laughing, of my childhood nightmares.
The theme that strokes me even harder in this match, though, is the more meta-level theme of adolescent bullying. From that perspective, the tickling is just one tool in the wrestlers’ arsenals to tauntingly dominate each other with a sensationally sexy mean edge. Forrest initiates the taunting slaps to the face and seriously hard shoves to the chest. Early on, as they’re on their knees and just starting to lean in for another lock-up, the red-headed hottie suddenly slaps his palms against Mickey’s chest and shoves him so hard that the French Canadian flies completely out of the frame. Then, when Mickey comes back into frame, he’s a cruise missile in flight, in a soaring, irritated, mean flying tackle that knocks Forrest to his back with authority!
Fuck, I love that heat! The mean edge to this entire match is such a fucking turn on to me, and it certainly appears to ignite some hungry lust in Forrest and Mickey. So, it’s not just climbing on top and physically dominating their opponent. It’s not just indulging in the spoils of victory by stealing hungry kisses. It’s doing all that, and then, when the wrestler on the bottom is melting, suddenly punching him in the gut, kneeing him in the balls, and/or turning the putty of the rocked hottie into a live wire of panic with more tickling. Forrest keeps amping up that mean edge in a way that seems to take Mickey (the relative rookie) by surprise. But it’s so fucking delightful to watch Mickey’s fuse get lit. That bitterness in the back of his mouth when he gets slapped in the face hard makes this handsome hottie tap into a sadistic mean side I don’t think we’ve seen from him before.
Another theme that, of course, grabs me by the balls is the truly sensational focus on two of the hottest asses in wrestling this year. Honestly, this match is sort of my fantasy pairing of the top two contenders for my vote for Best Ass of 2023. And, as if channeling me, Forrest and Mickey take delight in each other’s luscious glutes. There are repeated fold over pins where the wrestler on top wedgies his opponent’s undagear to expose those magnificent glutes. When it’s Mickey’s turn, he kneads and spanks Forrest’s alabaster cheeks until they are an angry, visibly hot shade of dark red. Fuck, Forrest’s ass is so fucking lush!
Forrest gives Mickey’s ass the passionate attention it deserves, as well. In fact, Forrest cops a feel of Mickey’s gorgeous body repeatedly whenever the handsome rookie is on top of him. Previous opponent’s have just not shown Mickey’s stunning physique sufficient love, as far as I’m concerned, but Forrest’s groping hands know exactly what I’m thinking whenever I see Mickey in action. But it’s when Forrest is on top, with his opponent’s sensational ass in his sights, that his brilliance really shines through. He wedgies and spanks and kneads Mickey’s golden glutes, sure. But he also bites them and licks them and yanks Mickey’s white briefs down to completely expose them. I don’t know if I was ever as convinced in a match that a wrestler was thinking and feeling exactly what I’m thinking and feeling, as when Forrest is squeezing and tasting and spreading Mickey’s straining, quivering cheeks.
So there are those themes to stroke various kinks and tastes… tickling, bullying, adoration of asses. But for any fan of homoerotic wrestling itself, the intensity of the competitive side of this match is just sensationally sexy. Fuck, Forrest’s scissors make me swoon as hard as they, quite clearly, make Mickey suffer. There’s an unscripted scrambling edge to the action that feels spontaneous and ego-driven. When Mickey smoothly and decisively pries Forrest open in a banana split spladle, just owning his quivering handstrings and taking possession of the red-head’s balls, the sweat and pain and delight painted across the entire scene is classic wrestling kink. The story grows suspenseful as the action turns ragged and bitter near the end of the 30+ minutes. They’re evenly matched in size, skill, and intensity, and I don’t know who’s going to score that last submission, until the loser is getting his face pounded with the victor’s grinding crotch, alternating with the victor’s hungry lips possessing the gorgeous loser’s mouth.
Fuck, I don’t know if this settles who gets my vote as having the Best Ass of 2003. This very well may include my vote for Hottest Liplock of the year. I do know for certain, however, that Mickey Knoxx, fiercely aggressive and bitter, executing offense with authority and looking like a total badass BOSS, is deliriously sexy! And that punkish, taunting, mean edge to Forrest has never been more successful in starting a inferno that the bearded babyface beauty may, or may not, be able to handle.
Another last minute 2023 indulgence I enjoyed was the rare all-out heel-on-heel battle between Brutal Brendan Byers and Monstah Mike, as part of BGE’s last hurrah of the year, Wrestle Worship 5: Power Struggle. To be honest, heel-on-heel matches don’t always land solidly for me. Too much heel energy (like too much jobber energy) can interrupt the momentum of a hot match, I find. Mike and Brendan are to absolutely hot heels who, if it were just the subtitle for this match, “Power Struggle,” might not have stroked me just right. But these two sensationally hot heels fuel the momentum of this match with something other than the classic innocence-spoiled angle, and that something is jet fuel: lust.
This is just Mike’s second match at BG East, after hitting the scene elsewhere, so his extremely cocky attitude could easily be a set up for even a sculpted muscle god like him to get slapped down. He’s so over the top contemptuous of absolutely any possible challenger that I honestly feel like Brendan might just be the pin to pop the bodybuilder’s balloon. “I’m going to dominate here, just like I dominate everywhere,” he boasts before Brendan arrives. Mike is joining me in eye fucking his superhuman proportions and luxuriously draped thick muscles. “I wish someone around here would give me a challenge. But nobody here’s going to mess with me!” And, yeah, it’s not hard to see where the contemptuous boasts come from. It’s like Mike Columbo and Joe Mazetti had a love child who went into competitive bodybuilding. And there’s just something about those trunks he’s wearing that somehow, impossibly really, make his super lean waist sitting on top of those gargantuan, rock hard muscle glutes, appear even more superhuman. I’m not exactly unhappy to report that those magnificent trunks get a bit translucent when Mike works up a thick sheen of sweat, as well. I’m even happier to report that, before this match is over, he’s yanking them down to shove Brendan’s face into the deep crevice between his magnificent cheeks.
But this is Brutal Brendan Byers who steps up to accept the challenge. Brendan towers nearly half a foot taller than Mike. I’m just going to say it again, Mike is fucking pretty, and he’s prettier than Brendan. Brendan’s got the thick, powerful, functional physique of headliner pro wrestler. He’s got this sexy layer of fur down his torso and inner thighs that contrasts sensationally against the baby-oiled smooth surfaces of Mike’s sculpted muscles. We saw what Mike’s bulldozing persona can do to an opponent when he thrashed the living fuck out of adorable Freddy Campbell in Wrestle Shack 31. But big Brendan is NOT adorable Freddy, and the seasoned erotic heel just does not whither under the scorching hot lens of Mike’s extreme self-confidence. Possibly the best line in wrestling this year is when Mike demands, rhetorically, “When was the last time you saw a chest like this,” and Brendan does not skip a beat before answering, “Whenever I look in the mirror.” Fuck, two hot bodies with massive, massive egos.
That jet fuel I mentioned earlier is spraying all over the place from start to finish in this match, as Brendan and Mike are both fucking INTO each other big time. Holy shit, it’s such a breath of fresh air when a homoerotic wrestler is saying what I’m thinking in admiring his opponent. “I’m impressed,” Brendan says, hungrily groping Mike’s Monstah pecs and shoulders, adding, “but you’re still going down.” Down the road, when Brendan is using his height to perfect advantage by wringing Mike out in a full nelson and grinding his crotch into those meaty glutes, he half-moans the confession “I love those tight muscles,” which, I swear to the homoerotic wrestling gods, I was thinking the exact same thing at that very moment.
Mike isn’t as verbally demonstrative, but the swelling bulge in his trunks and the way his breathing gets fast and ragged when he’s being “forced” to worship big Brendan is confession enough for me. When Brendan has Mike’s massive arms trapped in the ropes and he’s straddling the bodybuilder’s face, leaning forward and sucking on Mike’s nipples and licking his abs, the trapped muscle man is a study in extreme ambivalence. The way he really throws himself into his work when he’s kissing Brendan’s biceps and licking the brutal one’s sweaty pits sells the pleasure Monstah Mike is taking from having Brendan grant his wish to have someone around here give him a serious challenge.
Mike’s magnificent muscles take about 66% of the punishment in this match, and it’s thrilling to watch a body like that get worked on so hard. Watching a 230 pound muscle god cracked across an opponent’s thigh in an OTK backbreaker is just epic! And when Brendan’s got him there laid out and vulnerable, the brutal one swoops down and licks the sweat off of Mike’s heaving abs. Holy fuck, be careful what you wish for, Monstah Mike!
I say Brendan is in the driver’s sweat about 66% of the time, but it’s only the final 4 minutes that really matter in the end, when it comes to settling whether BG East has a new “sheriff,” as Mike so boldly announces, or if the old guard is still laying down the law of the land. I think one thing that keeps this heel-on-heel action in the sweet spot for me is that, while there’s a decisive “winner,” no one is hating it when the final round of forced muscle worship plays out. There’s no defense of fragile masculinity, as if being forced to worship a sensationally sexy body you are obviously hot for is somehow emasculating. They’re both fucking into the heat of the battle, into lusting over each other’s hot bodies, and neither of them is an ounce less of a total badass for it. It’s not like I think either of these sexy-as-fuck muscle heels has any tarnish at all on his sheriff’s badge, even though one of them is knocked out cold and pinned helplessly for the final 3-count victory. If anything, I’m hoping it just makes him hungrier. And hornier. And good luck to whoever is next to square off against either of these sensationally sexy bad ass muscle men!
The final flurry of new releases for the calendar year are out, and there are some eleventh hour gems in BG East’s catalog 173. One of the gems that wore me out is the tag team anchor match in Hunkbash 29. It features the recurring heel duo of Jonny Firestorm and Gabe Steel taking on a surprising rookie combo of former foes, Vinny Vigo and Tony Angeles. Jonny and Gabe bring the sneering, mustache-twirling, sadistic wickedness. Vinny and Tony bring the mountains of pretty, pretty (pretty!) muscle and a surprising unpredictability that made me unable to tear my eyes away to the very end.
I say “surprising unpredictability” not only because I have no idea what to expect from Team Muscle Hunk, but quite obviously, neither do Jonny or Gabe. And, I feel pretty certain, neither do Tony or Vinny, for that matter. I’m certainly not one to spread the rumor that a lot of professional wrestling is scripted, but if you subscribe to that nefarious conspiracy theory, I guarantee you that you’re going to reach the same conclusion that I did: the wrestling drama in this match goes way off script mostly thanks to Team Muscle Hunk. I honestly don’t know if Vinny and Tony don’t really understand the mechanics of tag team wrestling, or they just don’t give a shit and make up the rules as they go. The first explanation sort of jives with a hot-bodied rookie couple like these guys are supposed to be. Sort of eager, impressively endowed and enthusiastic, but maybe naive, poorly trained, a little sketchy on the idea of one partner tethered to their corner until the legal tag is made over the top rope. So, when Vinny leaves his corner, leans through the top two ropes and stretches his stunning (STUNNING) 6-foot physique to basically reach Tony in jeopardy several miles away from being anywhere near making a legal tag… maybe it’s sloppy over-exuberance and a lack of familiarity with the art and science of professional tag team wrestling. Or, on the other hand, maybe Tony and Vinny (and, honestly, mostly Vinny) have the heart of heels wrapped up in dazzlingly pretty babyface beauty, and they know full well they’re fucking with the rules because they just want to win. Either explanation sort of turns me on, for different reasons. But whatever explains it, it’s fucking genius, and I love it!
It’s not like upperclassmen Jonny and Gabe set a good example when it comes to coloring between the lines, of course. They do stick to conventional tags, but the badass boys sort of “forget” when one partner tags out that he’s supposed to actually climb back out to the ring apron and wait his turn. In other words, the double teams are fast and furious and earn this barely controlled chaos a legitimate claim to being a sensational “hunkbash.” Tony (bless his gorgeous cheekbones and astonishingly proportioned tapered-V) is the weakest link, and the heel sharks are almost literally licking their lips as they repeatedly isolate and double-team his Captain America-esque physique with gleeful passion.
Before the heels even set foot in the ring, Gabe has already called dibs on pounding the shit out of big Tony’s gorgeous bod. “That one just screams to get beat,” he explains to his heel mentor, Jonny. And, true enough, drop-dead gorgeous Tony folds like a house of cards A LOT as the hot and brutal action unfolds. And Jonny and Gabe milk the double teams on Tony longer and longer, sort of banking on Vinny not realizing that if they bust out a double-team, all bets are off when it comes to tagging. I mean, Tony was just no match for his bigger, badder tag team partner when they went at it a couple of catalogs ago in their double debut as part of Babyface Brawls 5. Sensing his vulnerability underneath all those magnificent muscles, Jonny and Gabe seriously fuck Tony up two-on-one several times, with Vinny getting more and more pissed watching on, seemingly uncertain of how to proceed.
One of the most sensational stories in this match is the evolution of how the heels regard Vinny. This dude is fucking HUGE. He’s the biggest wrestler in the ring, by quite a bit, and every pound is just ridiculously, luxuriously huge muscle. Pre-match, back when Gabe was calling dibs on Tony, perennial badass Jonny, around 50 pounds smaller than Vinny, seems unconcerned that it means Jonny’s task is to claim Vinny. But holy shit, once Vinny finally gets too pissed and impatient to care anymore what the rules are, he turns into a fucking steamroller!
Here’s where all of that chaotic spontaneity suddenly becomes intense… and fucking sexy as hell! Because neither Jonny nor Gabe can, individually, crack a dent in the 6′ wall of muscle that is Vinny. And even when they pull out the double-team on him, no shit, Vinny is most of the time STILL fucking in charge, because Gabe and Jonny, as powerful and experienced as they are, just cannot button Vinny down. At one point, when Vinny has exceedingly successfully come to Tony’s rescue and sent the heels scattering like rats caught in the beam of a flashlight, Gabe and Jonny circle back on him, determined to bring the behemoth down. The heels have Vinny’s Thor-esque physique strung taut into a double-team bow and arrow because, no shit, one of them would NOT have been able to pull that off. And, it turns out, BOTH of them together can’t pull that off! Sheer, raw, magnificent power busts big Vinny free in a way that clearly stuns Jonny and Gabe. And then, he wraps those anaconda arms around Gabe’s throat in a choke, from which Gabe is NOT going to escape. Simultaneously, his gargantuan thighs have snapped shut around Jonny, and for just a second there, I’m honestly worried about the legendary heel’s internal organs. Eventually, Tony drags his fine, fine, FINE ass back into the melee for Team Muscle Hunk to execute beautiful side-by-side take downs of the completely flummoxed heels, but seriously, Tony could have done a load of laundry and balanced his checkbook, because Vinny had the badboys rocked hard all on his own. “Hey, asshole,” Vinny snarls in this deep, deep base voice with an accent I can’t quite place but apparently my cock speaks fluently because it’s instantly responding. “I told you we’d kick your ass,” he taunts, as Team Muscle Hunk give each other high fives and flex over the fallen heels.
So, yeah, this definitely isn’t a squash. And, if you’ve ever read me before, you know that I’m thrilled to share that news. In fact, the balance of power teeters back and forth so much, and the action is so raw and messy and peppered with blown holds and abandoned moves, I’m thinking way, way near the end that this might be the most clever script-flip in homoerotic wrestling history, with the designated hunks being the ones dishing out the ultimate bashing. Tony (bless his succulent nipples and washboard abs) is in way over his head, but honestly, all he has to do is just stay in big Vinny’s wake. It’s suspenseful to the end, and I seriously think none of the four of them really know how this free-for-all was going to sort itself out until two overwhelmed wrestlers pass out in climactic side-by-side sleepers in the middle of the ring.
I’ve got a good friend who is, like Gabe, all about Tony Angeles these days. Tony’s got this smoldering, serious leading man vibe about him, with that classic babyface combo of traffic-stopping handsomeness and a fantasyman hot bod. He’s got a long way to go before he can stand up to the likes of Jonny or Gabe, but he could totally have a long and acclaimed career as a muscle jobber in the meantime. But if pressed to make a choice, I’ve got to say that I’m unequivocally Team Vinny. Not just because of those massive pecs and the light layer of fur on his lower abs, and not just because of his stunningly thick tree trunk thighs. It’s also the way he persistently climbs up to perch on the top turnbuckle to launch his rock hard body through the air like a bunker buster. And it’s the way he grabs Jonny’s ankle mid-kick and rumbles out in that crotch-stirring bass voice, “Now, it’s my turn.” And it’s because Vinny looks like he’s having fun. Like, when he’s crushing Jonny between his lushly thick thighs, he smiles and sticks out his tongue, just fucking LOVING the feel of dominating a frustrated opponent with his superior muscles. So, sure, sure, he’s a babyface beefcake… sort of. But he could totally be a muscle heel. Hell, in those few moments when he’s actually getting wrangled, his suffering sell is also lush, and he could totally be a muscle jobber. But even more exciting for me, I think Vinny could just be Vinny, an iconoclast who ignores convention and just has sensational fun making it up as he uses that epic physique to dominate opponents.
Monstah Mike is so fucking big and solid, he’s got the gravitational pull of planet. You can tell, because from the moment he debuts for BG East in WrestleShack 31: Cash or Cum (spoiler alert: the answer isn’t cash), Freddy Campbell is either circling him or crashing into him over and over again, and just has no chance in hell of reaching escape velocity. Mike has apparently been hired to work in accounts receivable at BG East. Some weasely red-headed jobber rented out the ring room for some private time, and then tried to skip out without paying the rent. Mike was probably told the name of the jobber, but, seriously, how many weasely little red-headed jobbers could be on the BG East payroll?
Freddy is seriously confused when Mike FILLS the doorway of the shack (and then some) with his gargantuan boulder shoulders and demands that he pay up. Unbeknownst to either Mike or Freddy, the real culprit was, of course, Forrest Taylor (honestly, doesn’t that sound more like Forrest, for some reason?). Fuck, Forrest is stirring up shit when he’s not even on site! “Bossman said to collect what he’s owed from some ginger jobber. Looks about right,” he says, giving Freddy a slow, appraising once over. “So, where’s the money?”
Freddy is duly impressed with Monstah Mike. “I don’t mind a handsome guest,” he says, checking the bodybuilder out with a grin. “But you’ve got the wrong guy. I don’t owe any money.” Future opponents take note: Monstah Mike doesn’t take “no” for an answer. A forearm smash across the chest (and, seriously, look at the size of that fucking forearm!?!?) knocks Freddy into the back wall of the shack.
The whole time, Freddy is protesting his innocence, and not for one second does it matter to the hired gun. Mike is going to beat the money out of him, and, by the looks of it, Mike enjoys his work. He tosses Freddy around like a rag doll. He repeated slams the wrong ginger jobber to the mat, and into the walls, and into his own rock hard body. Holy fuck, that’s hot! Mind you, Freddy has been putting on muscle in his last several matches. BG East has him listed at 185 pounds. But he might as well be 142-pound Forrest, for all it matters, with a fucking AVALANCHE of exquisite, gargantuan muscle pounding down on him and flattening him like a pancake.
It’s all overwhelming muscle and power in this match, and everything about it is absolutely convincing and incredibly hot. Early on, Freddy lashes out with some punches at those huge targets that are Mike’s pecs and I’m pretty sure the blows hurt Freddy a lot more than Mike. The debt collector folds Freddy like origami, wrapping him up in a small package and then, delightfully, showing just how much he enjoys his work by kneading and biting the ginger’s ass and stroking Freddy’s crotch. “Wasn’t expecting to have this much fun,” Mike mutters, good-naturedly, as he’s streamrolling and possessing Freddy at will.
The sexiest moments for me happen when Freddy finally finds the right button to push (a solid jab to Mike’s balls) to get some revenge on the strongman. When Freddy slides the debt collector between his legs to lock on body scissors, the ginger complains, “Fuck, I can barely get my legs around you!” And, indeed, fuck. Mike is just that fucking huge, every ounce of it solid, succulent muscle, to make it nearly impossible for Freddy to really lock down those scissors. Freddy makes the most of the moment, though. He gets a standing ovation from me for yanking on those ultra briefs Mike is wearing and wedgying the most muscly ass I’ve seen bared in a long time.
It’s Freddy’s spladle on Monstah Mike, though, that leaves me dizzy. Fuck, fuck, AND fuck, all that luxurious muscle ripped open wide. I’d bet cash Mike can crack walnuts with those glutes, but in that spladle, ass in the air, he’s whining and crying like a bitch. Mike SELLS that suffering, which makes the contrast between all that dazzling muscle and his complete helplessness sensationally epic. And Freddy is every fucking one of us, taunting the bodybuilder and clawing the fuck out of Mike’s balls.
Lest we blow past even my infamously adept ability to suspend disbelief, rest assured that Mike turns the tables back upright. And the hired muscle is now pissed. He snaps shut the beartrap of his monstah thighs around Freddy’s head and threatens to pop his skull like a grape. Mike picks him up and pins him against the shack wall, Freddy’s feet nowhere near the ground. He makes Freddy lick, suck, and kiss his massive muscles, wringing all the humiliation he wants out of the naughty boy for that embarrassingly sexy spladle a few moments earlier. Barehanded chokes and endlessly punishing bearhugs crush the wrongly-accused ginger like a beer can.
And speaking of beer cans… fuck, when Monstah Mike tugs his briefs down his sequoia thighs, out springs a cock to match the rest of Mike’s massively developed body. He gets himself even harder by pounding his un/lucky opponent’s face senseless with it. Naked, he sits on Freddy’s face and smothers the lucky ginger with those gargantuan muscle glutes. I go back and forth about how to describe Mike here, but I’m just going to say it. He’s fucking amazingly pretty. I mean, I don’t know how someone selling alpha dog muscle enforcer like he does would feel about that adjective. And it’s not like there’s anything delicate or demure about Mike. But nevertheless, I think he’s just astonishingly pretty, in that 5’10, 230-pound, sculpted muscle and early-80’s biker stash way he has about him. If it was a braver and better world we lived in, there’d be young homoerotic wrestling fans with posters of Monstah Mike hanging over their beds. I hope that IRL he’s got some adoringly infatuated boyfriend bringing him flowers and telling him he’s gorgeous every day, because as big and bad and intimidating as he is, he’s just fucking pretty. I can’t think of a better way to put it.
As incredibly impressive Monstah Mike is ALL over, there’s one super impressive muscle on Freddy that puts even the debt collector to shame. If you’ve watched many of Freddy’s matches, you know what I’m talking about. Even Mike’s impressed, admiring the school bus as he presses one of his hugely peaked biceps across Freddy’s throat and smothers the ginger with Mike’s sweaty briefs. Like me, Freddy doesn’t last long after that point. “Damn, boy,” Monstah Mike marvels, “you’ve been holding a lot in there! Good job!”
Freddy is a wasted pool of sweat and cum by the end. Mike looks like he’s super proud of his work, and hungry for another assignment from the boss man. Just as he’s finally walking out the door of the shack, he calls over his shoulder to Freddy, “You clean yourself up. And then GIVE ME THAT MONEY!”
Super fun, funny, and dizzyingly sexy encounter in WrestleShack 31. Freddy NEEDS to settle up accounts with Forrest somehow, and Monstah Mike needs to just keep doing whatever the fuck he wants with whoever the fuck he wants whenever the fuck he wants… as long as the cameras are rolling.
Yeah, that’s right. I happened to have a brief, but deeply meaningful (to me) exchange with Dio Characi. So, you know I’m going to name drop that brush-with-fame! Fuck, that man is hot. I asked him if he could recommend a match that he thought was his best, excepting every match I’ve already reviewed (which means excluding all of his BG East matches, because I have jumped all over every one of those!). Dio was adoringly self-deprecating, but he did mention that he thought his match with Mason Brooks on WatchFighters is “good.”
So, what Dio considers “good,” I find sensational! I mean, it’s not like I’m surprised that Mason v. Dio turns me on SO fucking hard. I’ve hardly been subtle about how much Dio’s wrestling yanks on my chain. And I’ve been infatuated about Mason(‘s nipples) from before I ever even saw him. All of these awesome ingredients were guaranteed to make this battle incendiary.
I love the chemistry between them that feels genuine and passionate. Dio sells his patented brand of seduction and fire-to-dominate that carries through in every match I’ve seen of his (including the ones where he jobs). He compliments Mason in this casual way that seems so spontaneous and authentic, and it costs him nothing in terms of his ability to dominate and intimidate. I’d love to see Dio give lessons to A LOT of other homoerotic wrestlers out there about how to say what we’re all thinking (e.g., yes, Mason unquestionably has sweet, strong pecs). He can afford to hand out compliments like a snack-sized candy bar to an underwhelmed trick-or-treater, because Dio is cooly confident in his superior strength and skill. It’s like that classic underground wrestling mind game taken to the next level. Not needing to try to undermine an opponent’s confidence with a ton of trash talk only serves to put Mason on notice that the babyface beefcake from Brazil is absolutely certain that he’s going to wipe the floor with him. And I love homoerotic wrestling where the attraction between the wrestlers doesn’t have to be subtext. Dio can both praise Mason’s objectively and obviously hot bod, and he can delight in thrashing him into submission. “You have a good ass,” Dio observes, enthusiastically slapping Mason’s stripped bare muscle butt, because it’s just plain the truth.
“Just ‘good!?’ Fuck you,” Mason snarks back in classic, cocky Mason fashion. He appears to be his delightfully authentic self as well, from the moment that he sees Dio’s bare torso when the Brazilian pretty boy pulls off his hoodie, and Mason can’t help himself but give those legendary pecs a squeeze. Over the course of his career (at least since I started watching him when he debuted with BG East), he’s evolved into such a hilariously snarky bitch. He has a genuine self-consciousness about him, in a good way, like the self-deprecating shots he takes at himself from time to time. For example, the way he deflects Dio’s compliment for his handsome face (“Let’s face it, the ass is better, to be honest”). Not to suggest Mason’s ego is anything but super-sized. He’s unflinchingly cocky and wields withering trash talk with surgical precision. “You thought you had me, huh?” He taunts and sneers, when he’s turned the tables on Dio’s out-of-the-gate offense, slapping on headscissors, a hammerlock, and a twist of Dio’s leg to turn him into a deliciously mouthwatering pretzel. “I did enjoy those pecs, though,” Mason admits, savoring his riding time. “Not gonna lie.”
Both sets of pecs are profoundly enjoyable, and honestly, the stars of the show. Both of these sensationally sexy hunks have stunningly gorgeous pecs, but it’s Dio who takes advantage of his (and of Mason’s obvious attraction to them) most effectively. He smothers the snarky bad boy for days on end with Mason’s face buried in the cleft between Dio’s hot pecs. Sometimes, frankly, it looks like Mason is hating it, screwing up his face and trying to pull away in a way that makes me want to slap some sense into him myself. Fuck, Mason, if you aren’t going to enjoy that ride, tag me in, damn it!!! But soon enough, Dio’s magical pecs weave their spell over even jaded snarkmaster Mason, who isn’t exactly hating his life around the time that Dio is forcing him to suck his nipples, absolutely in control and shoving Mason’s face from nipple to nipple to make sure they both get equal love.
Both stubborn and dangerous muscle boys demand a submission, but only Dio, with that fucking sexy and chill inevitability about him, is able to milk it out of his opponent. It’s that rear naked choke, threatening to put the snarling bad boy out cold, that Mason finally can’t trash talk his way out of. “I’m sure you don’t want this bicep wrapped around your neck like this, right,” Dio asks. It’s a rhetorical question, because Mason can’t say a word with his windpipe pinched close. The level of panic in Mason’s frantic fingers, tapping out his submission like a seasoned Morse code operator, is delicious. The babyface Brazilian muscle boy literally laughs as he enjoys watching all that swagger and cockiness evaporate like dry ice, leaving Mason sweaty, bitter, and beaten.
I’m so turned on by watching this cherubic-faced muscle boy absolutely bring bad boy Mason to heel. There’s a sweet, sweaty moment where Mason has been riding roughshod on his hunky guest, and he’s sitting on his face and forcing Dio to stroke his (let’s face it, stunningly hot) pecs. Dio does such a good job of it, and Mason is so cocksure of his superiority, that the Brazilian takes advantage of Mason’s aroused distraction to pop free. “Now, it’s my turn,” Dio snarls with this deep, fierce, bitter sincerity that brings tears to my eyes, moments before snapping shut the bear trap of his hairy thighs around Mason’s head. I’m having a hard time conveying just how hot those four words are, but again, it has to do with the intimate intensity and spontaneity of this entire match. It’s not campy. It’s not forced. It’s just fucking fiercely sexy! At another point, after the fateful submission, when Dio is demanding that his beaten opponent worship his armpit, Mason is apparently half-assing it and just kissing Dio’s sweaty curls with his lips. “Use your tongue!” Dio fucking growls at him in a way that makes my crotch squirm at exactly the same instant it makes Mason stick out his tongue and start obeying.
The subission come 13 minutes into the rough and tumble session, mind you, with another 9 minutes or so left for Dio to savor the spoils of victory. There are a few moments where I think his bullying commands are going to make Mason start to fight again, but no shit, Mason got beat, and he knows it. And, judging by his hard cock coming out to play and getting totally put over the top by Dio’s battering his face with the Brazilian’s force-fed pec bouncing, Mason’s “okay” with finally admitting defeat.
The set-up is spartan, a couple of small blue wrestling mats on a wood floor. The camera work is pretty remarkable, putting you right into the room with them unselfconsciously. It’s pretty much all close-ups because space is limited, but it just feels intimate, not cramped. The product totals almost 23 minutes, with about 40 seconds of intro/outro graphics, and about a minute of pre-match chatter and sizing each other up. You’ll see Mason in all his naked glory, but Dio’s singlet, straps down, just barely stays on his gorgeous body.
I love knowing that when Dio thinks about the scope of his wrestling resume, this hot, intimate, intensely physical grappling session-turned muscle worship and domination rises to the top of his list of “good” ones. Holy fuck, can you imagine how dazzlingly sexy a match would have to be for Dio to classify it as “great?!”
Sidelineland 