Working Stiff: Wrestling's History With Playboy Magazine

The WWF's product became increasingly licentious, squarely (or roundly) centred around Sable and her co-stars' curves. Things peaked, in a manner of speaking, during a bikini contest between Sable and Jacqueline at the Fully Loaded '98 pay-per-view. The former, despite initially being awarded the victory, was disqualified on a technicality; her 'bikini' had been a pair of glittering handprints painted over her bare breasts. The tats were out the bag, as it were.

Almost a decade after Madusa had bared all for Playboy, Hugh Hefner again looked to marry the bounciness of the ring with that featured in his rag, only this time, there would be no pretence of modesty preventing its publication. It was a marriage made in heaven from the outset, allowing WWF to give their viewers exactly what they wanted without being taken off the air, whilst Hef could boost his own increasingly irrelevant magazine off the back of the WWF's momentum. There was only one candidate for centrefold conversion: Sable.

The April 1999 edition of Playboy was one of the highest-selling of its near half-century run, thanks to the imported popularity of the WWF sensation. Curiously, despite being at the apex of her prestige, the shoot caused an on-screen tweak to Sable's character, as she began to characterise herself as the 'Diva of the WWF'. The appellation would stick, becoming synonymous with wrestling's women for the better part of the next two decades. The pejorative connotations were casually ignored.

Life soon began to imitate erotic art, as Sable's ego ballooned in response to her successful shoot. Now considering her stock to be on an equal footing with the company's highest draws, the record-breaking Playmate began making demands of the WWF far outstripping her value - even as a stripper. The excursion to the Playboy mansion had made Sable too popular, and it became clear the sand was running out on her time in the company.

In a scenario strangely similar to that of future husband Brock Lesnar, Mero departed the company, expecting to earn more on her own. It was a well-measured gambit; later that year, she became the first woman in Playboy history to twice feature on its cover, the second time under her real name.

The next WWF 'Diva' to denude themselves within the glossy pages of Playboy couldn't have been less emblematic of the term.

A muscle-bound Amazonian woman with actual wrestling training, Joanie 'Chyna' Laurer was the antithesis of the buxom bimbo the company had been keen to promote prior to her debut. Instead, she was - with no degree of incredulity - considered a possibility to be the group's first inter-gender wrestler.

Here was a woman who was as big as the men, and thanks to her unique appearance, as popular. For many on the roster, the prospect of losing to a woman was anathema; in one infamous incident, Jeff Jarrett held the company up to the tune of $200,000 for him to drop his Intercontinental strap to Laurer on his way out of the company.

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