The Sierra Wrestling All-Stars Thread, CRITICAL Edition

This month at Inside Wrasslin’, we are proud to bring you yet another Biographical Spotlight on a famous name of the wrestling world. This month’s focus is a man whose name is known to wrestling fans worldwide, but whom younger fans may not know the whole story of. So join us as we turn back the pages of history to look at the career of “The Mountaineer,” Jim Tarler.

James Randolph Tarler was born December 10th, 1958 in Chattanooga, Tennessee, the son of Arnold and Regina Tarler. The young Tarler’s childhood life was, for the most part, distinctly suburban, except in the summers, when his family would go camping in the Appalachian Mountains. There, his father would tell him stories of the legendary mountain men of Appalachia, who had proven critical in the Revolutionary War. Most of all, young James loved the stories of the great Bradley Tarler, from whom their family descended. Bradley, it is said, once arrived at a battlefield to realize he’d left his ammunition back at camp, and, undaunted, charged a regiment of British soldiers with only his unloaded musket and bayonet, and lived to tell the tale, having killed 10 men in that battle alone. James idolized his famed ancestor’s legendary courage and toughness.

Another major influence on James’ young life was wrestling. He grew up watching NWA wrestling on TV, and was a big fan of the Funks. Wrestling held a strong fascination for James and in the spring of 1976, he decided to drop out of high school to become a professional wrestler. Unfortunately, wrestling did not come easily or naturally to him, and it would be a full 3 years of gruelling training before he was ready to make his debut. When asked, Jim recalls that it was only “sheer dog stubbornness” that got him through his training, because “it sure wasn’t natural athletic talent.” When it came time to come up with a moniker, James decided to call back to his ancestor, Bradley Tarler, and became known as “The Mountain Man” James Tarler. In those early years, he would tell fans from friends based on who called him “James” and who called him “Jim,” his preferred nickname among his friends.

Change came rapidly. In 1983, a friend and promoter convinced James to shorten and “punch up” his ring name, going from the Mountain Man James Tarler to the Mountaineer Jim Tarler (and, for a while after, he simply went by “Mountaineer Jim”). In 1984, he married childhood friend Sandy Lorrins, and in 1986, the couple had their first child together, James Jr. At around the same time, Jim would also have his first run-ins with what would be his greatest rivals, “Iron” Aaron Castille (father of SWA wrestler and color commentator Tony Castille) and Brad “The Barrier” Darren. Years later, Jim would fondly remember the mid ‘80s to early ‘90s as the peak of his career, feuding across the country with Castille and Darren.

Though Jim’s popularity as a wrestler was at its highest through this period, especially after he replaced his Claw finisher with an impactful power bomb in 1990, there was trouble brewing at home. Jim started doing international tours in other countries, wrestling in Canada and Japan. He was away more and more. When his second son, Brad, named after the legendary Tarler family patriarch, was born in 1991, Jim was thousands of miles away, across the Pacific. In 1994, he missed James Jr.’s 8th birthday party, arriving a day late with muttered excuses and some wrestling action figures, still in their shopping bag, for a present.


File photo: Jim Tarler taking on rival "Iron" Aaron Castille in a show in Japan in 1995. This match has been something of a white whale for collectors over the years, with no known good video copy existing.

As the 90s wore on, the constant wrestling and travel were also starting to take their toll on Jim’s body. Years of wrestling a high-impact style, especially for such a large man (at peak condition he weighed well over 260 pounds), had damaged his joints. He started wearing heavier and heavier kneepads, but the pain in his knees, hips, and back just got worse over time. Unwilling to lighten his schedule, Jim turned to greater and greater doses of painkillers to keep up. Jim estimates he was also spending “hundreds of dollars a weekend” on alcohol, and he started to get an unsavory reputation for drunkenness. When Jim went touring in other countries, a fellow wrestler would be assigned to watch how much he drank and cut him off if he got too drunk.

Things came to a head in 1998. During a tour in Japan, Jim got away from his assigned chaperone and ended up coming to the ring that night still severely impaired. During a key point in the match, Jim overbalanced, and both he and his opponent fell over the ropes to the outside in a nasty spill. Jim staggered away from the match with a herniated disk in his back that would cause him pain and numbness for years afterward. His opponent, Kenji Hoshino, wasn’t so lucky – the broken neck he suffered that night ended his career. Jim was thrown off the tour and sent home.

What followed when Jim got home from Japan was what Jim and Sandy both identified as the hardest conversation of their marriage. Sandy outlined the flaws in their relationship, and the ways in which things would need to change for the marriage to continue. That included no more drinking, no more pills, and no more leaving the family alone for months at a time. Decades later, Jim reflects that he “might have walked” at that time were it not for the retirement of rival Aaron Castille, who had decided to leave the road to spend more time with his family, and the acrimonious divorce of his other main rival, Brad “The Barrier” Darren, both around the same time. Seeing the two paths before him, Jim chose to hang up his boots. The Mountaineer was no more.

Desiring a chance to get away from Jim’s old stomping grounds and the temptation of being around his wrestler friends, the Tarler family moved across the country to Beaverton, Oregon, where Jim took up a job at an auto dealership. Over the next decade, Jim put wrestling out of his mind and concentrated on spending time with his family. He spent more time with his sons, cultivating with them a relationship he admits he “should’ve had from the beginning.” He worked on physical therapy for his back, and counselling to heal the rift in his marriage. He turned out to be a natural salesman, and did well at the auto dealership. That might’ve been the end of this story were it not for chance bringing wrestling back into Jim’s life once again.

In the corner of the dealership’s showroom was a TV that was usually tuned to football games or the local news. One evening in 2009, as Jim was closing up shop, he happened to notice a wrestling broadcast on the TV. The promotion was Sierra Wrestling All-Stars, and one of the wrestlers on the screen was Tony Castille. The face of the younger Castille, looking the spitting image of his father, brought up a flood of memories and emotions for Jim. He described the sensation as like “being struck by lightning.”

“I couldn’t explain it,” Jim says, “but I just knew. Seeing the Castille kid, the energy of that crowd, the style and energy of the wrestling going on, I knew I had to be involved somehow.” All it took was seeing one match, and Jim was convinced. The harder part was convincing Sandy. Mrs. Tarler had gone through enough heartbreak over the wrestling industry, and she was quick to remind Jim of the rules they had established.

“No drinking, no pills, no being away for months at a time,” Sandy recites. She also added a new restriction. “I said to him ‘if they tell you to screw off, that’s it. No more wrestling,’” she recalls. “Nothing’s sadder than an old man chasing after his glory days.”

Jim was relieved, then, when SWA agreed to bring him on, provisionally at first, for a couple special attraction matches, with the possibility of further work backstage if he fit well with the culture. Not only were his special attraction matches a big hit, SWA was looking for some experienced hands backstage to help manage the talent and keep tempers in check in the locker room. SWA’s small size and relatively restricted range of operations at the time made it easy for Jim to keep his promise to Sandy not to be away from home for long periods of time.

However, in 2010, SWA was starting to undergo a period of explosive growth, and soon the touring range started to expand. From just Oregon, Washington, and some parts of California, SWA’s touring range was started to cover the entire west coast and further, including shows as far as Denver, Colorado. SWA co-owner James Fushichou was also starting to broach the idea of doing SWA shows in his native Japan. Mindful of his deal with his wife, Jim knew that he would not be able to continue in his role, and, with a heavy heart, prepared to tender his resignation.

However, fate and the wrestling industry were not quite done with Jim yet. As luck would have it, SWA's expanding operations had left the company with a need for some additional roles in promotions and public relations. Seeing Jim's desire to remain involved with the company, James Fushichou made a counteroffer: Jim could transfer from the locker room to the office. Jim was initially resistant, not wanting to "just sit on my ass all day," but Fushichou stood ready to sweeten the pot: Jim could still have matches when SWA broadcast out of Portland.

"That was just about the push I needed," Jim recalls. He accepted the job, and steadily proved his worth in the role. Today, Jim Tarler wears the hats of talent relations, Public Relations manager for the company's home markets in Washington and Oregon, and, when time and opportunity permit, wrestler. When not at work, Jim enjoys spending time with his family, notably his grandchildren. When we asked if there would ever be another generation of wrestling Tarlers, Jim laughed.

"If there's one thing wrestling's taught me, it's never say never. Neither of my sons ever got into the business, but we'll see what the future holds."

Inside Wrasslin' would like to extend our thanks to Jim and Sandy Tarler, who graciously invited us into their home, providing hours of stories and hospitality while this article was being worked on.