Hulk Hogan Calls Racist Comments “A Speed Bump”
Hulk Hogan is one of the most iconic figures in the history of wrestling but for some, his legacy remains in tatters after he was recorded making extremely racist remarks in 2007.
In 2015, a tape leaked of Hulk Hogan going on a racist tirade back in 2007 and admitting to being “a racist, to a point” as he used the n-word repeatedly. As a result, WWE ended its contract with him and Hogan was suspended from the WWE Hall of Fame before he returned to both in 2018.
Speaking on The MMA Hour, Hulk Hogan addressed the controversy over his racist comments, noting that people knew that’s not who he was but says the main thing he has been worried about over the last few years was his back surgeries:
“There was a temporary situation where I thought, ‘Okay, where’s this going to end up at? Where’s this gonna wind down? Where’s the legacy, where’s this, that.’ At the end of the day, there had been so much goodwill with the Hulk Hogan brand, and people knew me so well, I mean I’ve been around over 40 years. People know me so well, from Mike Tyson to Brutus Beefcake to Vince McMahon to Verne Gagne to Bret Hart, everybody knows me so well that they knew that I would come back and I would become the person that I was.
“There was a temporary situation with the surgeries and some of the racial stuff that went down. It was a speed bump, but that’s not who I was, and everybody knew that. So it was a tough time, but the main thing that really got me were the surgeries over the last ten years. That was the thing that was in question.
“When you come out of a back surgery and someone tells you you’re never gonna walk again, that will really screw your head up. The rest of this stuff, I had a bunch of people on my side, I had a huge support system. People that knew me stuck with me, and it’s just been amazing to see how the fans have stayed with me.”
Hulk Hogan also noted during the interview that he was asked by Shane McMahon to return to WWE for a match against McMahon at WrestleMania 39 and noted the match could still happen at WrestleMania 40.