Brian Blair started his wrestling career in 1977 as a good guy. Since then, that label hasn't always stuck.

A native of Gary, IN (born Jan. 12, 1954), Blair went to the University of Louisville on a football scholarship and learned his trade as a wrestler under Hiro Matsuda in Florida. After completing his training, he joined the Florida Championship Wrestling troupe in 1977, encountering Hulk Hogan as one of his early opponents.

That led to a gig with Leroy McGuirk's Tri-State Wrestling out of Kansas City, and marriage to McGuirk's daughter Michelle (better known as Mike). That relationship proved short lived, however, when Mike was caught in an affair with another wrestler while she and Blair were estranged. According to Chad Bonham's book Wrestling With God, feelings eventually ran so high that Leroy McGurik shot at his son-in-law.

At that point, it seemed prudent for Blair to exit the Midwest and pick up with Fritz Von Erich's Texas-based World Class Championship Wrestling. There, Blair and Al Madril won the American tag team title before losing it to Killer Tim Brooks and Ahmad Hussein in 1981.

That short-lived reign, however, was enough to earn the attention of famed wrestler entrepreneur Vince McMahon, who added Blair to the World Wrestling Federation. After a measure of success as a solo act, Blair joined forces with Jim Brunzell to form a tag team known as the Killer Bees.

The Bees never won a WWF title, but often competed in title matches. Their signature routine was to don identical masks at some point in their bouts, thus confusing their opponents.

They also feuded flamoyantly with the Hart Foundation (Brett Hart and Jim Neidhart), battling them in over 100 matches. Blair must not have carried a grudge, however, because he named his first-born son Bret after Brett Hart.

Blair and Brunzell eventually left WWF and became regulars with the Universal Wrestling Federation, winning that circuit's tag team belt with a victory over The Warlord and Power Warrior.

Injuries finally forced Blair into retirement, and he took a job managing four Gold's Gyms in the Tampa Bay area. In 2002, he decided to run for County Commissioner of Hillsborough County and lost to Pat Frank. Two years later, he regrouped and ran again, this time claiming a narrow victory over Bob Buckhorn.

As it turned out, Blair’s time in office was short, but he was rarely out of the spotlight. When the city of Tampa announced it would observe a Day of Silence in support of gays ands lesbians being bullied by their peers, Blair declared it “preposterous.”

“Can you imagine a day in support of heterosexuality?” he asked rhetorically. “That would never happen.”

This was one of the factors that led Kevin Beckner, a gay man, to go after Blair’s job. In 2008, he succeeded.

On June 21, 2009, Blair found himself in the headlines again when he was charged with beating up sons Brett and Bradley, putting 15-year-old Brett in a chokehold and punching 13-year-old Bradley in the face.