In 1984, my younger brothers and I were all in on collecting G.I. Joe. Star Wars had been all but purged from our house and Joe dominated our toy room. We had most of the 1983 vehicles and figures. And, 1984 had been equally good to us. But, there were still many toys we didn't have as we headed into the fall gift giving season. It was in October that my younger brother acquired a Slugger for his birthday. While not as impressive as the MOBAT, the Slugger was the first heavy artillery vehicle in our collection. And, it quickly found itself in the center of play.
The Slugger itself isn't all that complex. There's a top and bottom of the tank. And, it has the huge cannon. It features very few parts. There's just a stabilizer, hatch door, machine gun and engine cover. But, these parts alone take a relatively boring tank and make it something much more useful. The cockpit allows for the driver to sit both above the hatch to operate the machine gun and under the hatch to keep the driver protected. The engine cover is pretty good as it allows for some play with repairs, etc. The colors are muted and in line with vehicles produced prior to 1985. In short, it's a neat toy for the middle price point vehicles. There's some molded details that would have been nice to have been real. But, that would have jumped the price on the Slugger beyond what parents in 1984 would have likely paid.
I have three main memories of the Slugger. Each are specific instances where the Slugger was featured in a memory. Beyond them, most of my general memories of the Slugger were of frustration. I liked vehicles that could hold many figures. The Slugger just held one figure in the driver's seat. I made attempt after attempt to sit other Joe figures on the rise opposite the engine. But, figures didn't really hold their seats very well. And, if you moved the Slugger, the figs positioned on the back would fall off. This limited the Slugger's use. And, as our Thunder arrived damaged, he wasn't a figure that I really tried to get into my rotation.
My main memory of the Slugger comes from that October in 1984 when the vehicle first came into our collection. For some reason, there was a small hole that had been dug in our front yard. I don't recall the circumstances of it being there. But, I noticed it was the perfect size for the Slugger to fit into. I put the Slugger into the hole and, from here, it could command the entire right side of our front yard. The tank was lowered enough to be difficult to hit with small arms fire. But, the cannon and the driver mounted machine gun were above ground and could rain fire down upon Cobra. In order to better hide the Slugger, I pulled some green grass and laid it over the top of the vehicle. The Slugger stayed in this position, destroying Cobra for three or four days. Then, the grass on top of it had started to yellow so I took the Slugger out of the hole and back inside for more adventures.
My second Slugger memory would have had to have occurred in the summer of 1985. I was visiting my Grandfather in Buffalo, NY. For some reason, as I was picking which vehicle I would take with me, the Slugger spoke to me. I guess I hadn't played with it in a while. So, it got the honor of going on the trip. I've mentioned playing at my grandfather's house before. But, nearly all our adventures were on the stone steps in front of his house. One day on this trip, though, I decided to play in his small backyard. Here, he had a flower garden that had a small trough in the dirt between the garden and the grass. Cobra had to cross this treacherous area. So, the Joes installed a Slugger between the giant flower plants. I remember playing this out one afternoon in the bright sunshine. So, the next morning, I went out to continue the adventure. However, as the garden was shaded in the morning, it was too cold to be outside and I had to wait until the sun moved before I was able to resume my story. It was the only time I used his backyard as the setting for battles, though.
My final Slugger memory was one of those dumb childhood acts of hubris. Being older than most of the kids who played with Joe in the neighborhood, I liked to show off how smart I was. So, one day, as one of the neighborhood kids had his Slugger out, I decided to show him and some other kids how the stabilizer worked. I stuck the spikes on the stabilizer into some soft dirt. I then pretended for the Slugger to fire. However, I didn't just yell "BANG". No. I decided to simulate the force of the cannon firing and pushed the Slugger back against the stabilizer as hard as I could. The stabilizer did not give ground. Instead, the force split the Slugger in two and pulled the top half from the bottom half of the tank! Fortunately, none of the tabs were broken. But, they were strained and that poor kid's Slugger was never the same. I learned not to screw around like that as the last thing I wanted was to have to replace the kid's toy with my hard earned lawn mowing money.
The Slugger was released the world over. After the Hasbro release debuted in 1984, it then appeared in Brazil and Argentina. Sometime after that, Hasbro offered the Slugger as a mail away. However, the mail away version was missing the cammo pattern of the original release. This is a highly desired variant of the Slugger. Hasbro then dropped it one final time in 1997. This brown version was a decent update to the Slugger and is also a must have for the mold. That was the end, though, as the Slugger didn't reappear again in the 2000's. So, there's 5 major variants of the mold that are worth tracking down. Though, I'd have quickly bought another Slugger design during the repaint era.
There was a time when Slugger's were the bane of any collection acquiring collector's existence. They were stupidly common and no one wanted them. Slowly, though, in the last 20 or so years, things have changed. Now, the Slugger is fairly popular. Fortunately, it's still really easy to find a mint Slugger. There's not much to them, so they're usually in good shape. What they are not, though, is complete. The Slugger features 4 removable parts from the main base. Three of these, the machine gun, the hatch cover and the hatch peg are a pain in the ass to find. And, as such, you'll pay for them. Sans these three items, Sluggers are a couple of bucks each. You'll probably pay more in shipping than you will for the body of the vehicle.
Complete Sluggers sell in the $30 to $40 range. But, you'll add another $10 to $12 for shipping. The hatch cover and pin will run you at least $20. And, the machine gun usually sells for $25 or so. So, it's definitely worth just buying a complete one. The upside is that the machine gun mold was used both for the 1997 Slugger as well as the Cobra Surveillance Port. While both of these uses are in different colors, they still look good with the original Slugger and fit the slot for the weapon. So, you can economize if you are a bit scrappy. I'm not sure this vehicle will give you $50 of enjoyment, though. While it does look good, it still only holds one figure and takes up a lot of space. But, for the right price, it's a classic piece and is an essential part of an early Joe convoy.
