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TJR: Remembering Hulk Hogan

By John Canton • Published Jul 24, 2025 19:01 EDT
Hulk Hogan poses for the crowd WWE

It was reported today that the legendary WWE Hall of Famer Hulk Hogan passed away at the age of 71. His real name was Terry Bollea. The cause of death has been reported as cardiac arrest.

Hulk Hogan was the reason many people became pro wrestling fans, including many of you reading this right now. I think it’s fair to say he’s arguably the most famous pro wrestler ever. Yes, Dwayne Johnson, aka The Rock, is more famous, but he has also been mostly in Hollywood for the last 20 years. In contrast, Hogan was part of pro wrestling for a lot longer. Love him or hate him, The Hulkster is one of he most famous pro wrestlers ever.

As a kid growing up in the 1980s, I had older cousins and siblings who got me into pro wrestling. I can still remember watching the tape of WrestleMania 3 and then seeing future WrestleManias live. Hulk Hogan was a huge part of that. You could even make the point that there’s no WrestleMania without Hulk Hogan. There’s certainly no “Rock N Wrestling” boom without Hulkamania leading the way. Vince McMahon deserves a lot of credit, of course, but he had to have the right guy to lead the way, and that was Hulk Hogan.

Hulk Hogan Was Truly Larger Than Life

Hulk Hogan was a 6’6” and 300-pound man who was balding in his 30s and had a ridiculous mustache, but he was also a hero to millions around the world. Those of us who fell in love with pro wrestling saw him get his ass kicked by the heels (the bad guys) many times, yet he found a way to fight back, overcome, and ultimately win many titles along the way.

For a lot of us, Hulk Hogan was the guy who got us into pro wrestling, and he was our first favorite pro wrestler. There are likely many wrestlers whom we watched in later years who became wrestlers because of the impact that Hulk Hogan had on their lives. Personally, I was a “Macho Man” Randy Savage guy, but I didn’t mind Hogan, and I certainly cheered for him a lot too. I had the Hogan pillow, the action figures, the thumb wrestlers, played the video games, and, of course, followed his career.

The phrase “larger than life” comes to mind. When Hulk picked up Andre the Giant and gave him a body slam at WrestleMania 3, many people thought that was impossible. As kids, we didn’t know they had wrestled in the past, and many people slammed Andre in matches before that. The way it was presented was as if Hulk was some kind of superhero who had the power to do that to Andre while others couldn’t do it. That’s what pro wrestling is. It’s about telling a story to the audience watching, whether they are in the arena or watching at home.

When we think about Hulk Hogan’s promos, the phrase “What are you gonna do when Hulk Hogan runs wild on you?” is something we are always going to remember. Sure, it’s cheesy and it’s straight out of the 1980s, but man, that shit was so damn cool back in those days. Add in the fact that Hogan would flex his big muscles, do his ear cupping routine, and play to the crowd – these are all things he did so well. You could argue he did it better than anybody else in his era because that’s what made him the biggest star of his era.

As news of his death spreads around the world, we are seeing media outlets that rarely cover pro wrestling mentioning Hulk Hogan because they recognize his immense popularity. Hulk was so big that, when he was in his prime, he was one of the most famous people in all of pop culture, not just in pro wrestling.

There are so many WWE matches I’ll remember fondly of Hogan, especially the ones at WrestleMania. I already mentioned WrestleMania 3. I recall WrestleMania 6 with Ultimate Warrior very well, and it wasn’t necessarily a great match, but it was better than a lot of people thought. Hogan deserved a lot of credit for that.

Jumping ahead to WrestleMania 18, it was so cool to see Hulk Hogan in the ring with The Rock. What’s funny is that at the time, we thought Hogan was so old at 49 years old, yet there are so many wrestlers today who are in their mid-to-late 40s who are doing fine out there. Hulk certainly looked old, yet he got through it and put over Rock clean in the middle of the ring.

If you want to show a non-wrestling fan a match that perfectly exemplifies why crowd reaction is so significant in pro wrestling, I suggest showing them the Rock-Hogan match from WrestleMania 18. The way that Toronto crowd came alive for the most basic things is an example of how over somebody is. They went crazy because of the years of Hogan bumping his ass off in the ring and making us love the pro wrestling business. It was the simplest things like flexing, cupping the ear, and of course, Hulking Up to make the big comeback.

Hulk Hogan’s Legacy In Pro Wrestling Grew Because Of WCW

I recall Hulk Hogan’s move to WCW in 1994 vividly. At the time, I was following WCW pretty closely, but it wasn’t that big for some of us in Canada. When Hulk went over, plus later on, Macho Man and others from WWE, it made a huge impact. If it were anyone other than Hogan, I doubt it would have had as much impact. That’s a credit to his name and star power. You can’t deny the impact he had on the business of pro wrestling. To WCW’s credit, they put Hogan in the ring with Ric Flair right away and sold out buildings all over the place. I loved that rivalry, and it made me pay more attention to WCW.

At Bash at the Beach 1996, Hulk Hogan turned heel by joining Kevin Nash and Scott Hall to create the NWO. When John Cena turned heel earlier this year, some people said it was the best heel turn because of how shocking it was. I didn’t really agree with that because it depends on how they followed up on it. Needless to say, Cena’s heel turn hasn’t set the wrestling world on fire. Certainly not in the way that Hogan’s heel turn did. You can also point to WCW’s success over the next two years when they became bigger than WWE. Without Hulk Hogan turning heel, would it have happened? I’d say probably not.

This is what I wrote about Hogan’s heel turn at WCW Bash at the Beach 1996 in my review of that show:

“Nobody else could have been in that spot and done that angle the same way. Hogan is the biggest reason why the New World Order worked so well. He was the best choice for it. It worked so well because Hogan was the biggest name in the WWF for a lot of years and there were people that legitimately thought that Hall & Nash were sent there by the WWF to take over WCW. That’s how the angle was presented in its original form. If they put Sting in that spot (that was a rumor), it wouldn’t work as well because he had no history with the WWF at that point. Hogan fit the angle better than anybody else.

Another factor that really worked was the fact that Hogan wasn’t on WCW TV when Hall debuted two months before this. He had no affiliation with Hall or Nash. He was out filming movies and TV shows at the time, so when he came back at this event, the immediate thought was that he was there to stop Hall and Nash. Instead, he sided with them as he dropped the leg on Savage.

His promo after the match was outstanding. Telling the fans to “stick it” was so unlike anything Hogan had ever said or done in his career. He was the biggest face in professional wrestling for about 12 years before that moment, so for him to say that meant a lot. If John Cena were to turn heel in WWE today it might have a significant impact on things, but it won’t be like what Hogan did. I thought this was the defining moment of his career.

Hogan’s actions in this match and his promo after the match was the best performance of his career. I know people can argue for other things, but I think this tops them all.”

I wrote that in 2016, which was 20 years after the Bash. And John Cena did turn heel at WWE Elimination Chamber in March in Toronto, which is a show I was at. Life works in funny ways, my friends.

Regarding the NWO heel turn, “Hollywood” Hulk Hogan said this about it years later:

“I was thinking I knew I was going to piss everybody off. I knew it. I didn’t know if it was going to work as good [as it did]. I knew I was going to get heat for flipping everybody off, but when [the crowd] started throwing stuff into the ring, when Kevin [Nash] and Scott [Hall] and I were standing there with ‘Mean’ Gene, when they started throwing bottles and paper and everything into the ring, I knew it worked then.”

Hulk Hogan did many interviews talking about having over a dozen back injuries. I’ll be honest when I say that sometimes we (pro wrestling fans) laughed at Hogan interviews because he was known for bullshitting more than just about any pro wrestler ever. However, I specifically remember him saying that he regrets using the leg drop as a finishing move because dropping the leg on the bad guy at many house shows and televised matches likely caused significant damage to his back. It probably shortened his life as well. There may not have been a better and more memorable big leg drop than the one that led to the formation of the NWO.

Saying Goodbye To Hulk Hogan

Over the last decade or so, it’s impossible to ignore how Hogan tarnished his legacy. Making racist comments about black people made a lot of people hate him and with good reason. The way many of us were raised was to look at others as equals and not hate them because of their color. In the years that followed, many people who knew Hogan said he didn’t apologize enough for the things he said. If he showed more remorse for his hurtful comments, would people have forgiven him? Maybe. We will never truly know.

When Hulk Hogan last appeared in front of a WWE crowd at Raw’s Netflix premiere in Los Angeles on January 6th, he was booed heavily. Some people think it’s because of his past comments, others believe it was because he supported Donald Trump for President, and California is seen as anti-Trump. I don’t know exactly why the crowd booed, but it likely hurt Hogan’s feelings, and many people who didn’t like him in his final years will say he deserved it.

I’ll remember Hulk Hogan as one of the most important people in the history of pro wrestling. I won’t recognize him as one of my favorites because I liked others more, but I will certainly remember many moments that made me happy. I’ll also think of him as somebody who tarnished his legacy and certainly could have done a better job of showing remorse for some of the hurtful things he did in his life…and I don’t mean being a heel pro wrestling character.

What I learned the most from Hulk Hogan and others from his era is what made me a pro wrestling fan. What matters in pro wrestling is how it makes you feel. Sometimes things happen that make you cheer, and other times things happen that you boo. The art of pro wrestling is about feeling more than anything. It’s not about match quality or delivering a memorable promo. It’s about what you feel. Even when you’re a “smart” fan who thinks they know about how pro wrestling works, you can still get worked up because of a wrestler winning or losing a match. It’s why I can celebrate Macho Man’s first WWE Title win at WrestleMania 4 when I was a kid, the same way as Cody Rhodes’ first WWE Title win at WrestleMania 40, which I attended live. That’s the art of this thing we love – the moments. And Hulk Hogan was undoubtedly a moment’s guy.

I think Hulk Hogan perfected the art of pro wrestling by doing a fantastic job of making us feel good or bad based on what he did in that ring. For that, he deserves a lot of credit, and it’s also why he’ll be remembered forever.

Rest in Peace, Terry Bollea aka Hulk Hogan…brother.