Hulk Hogan Reflects On His Concerns Before Historic nWo Heel Turn

Hulk Hogan has opened up about the concerns he had before making his famous heel turn at WCW’s Bash at the Beach pay-per-view in 1996, which led to the formation of the nWo.

In a 2021 interview with Sports Illustrated, Hulk Hogan revealed that while he had no worries about playing the villain, he questioned whether the timing was right for such a major shift.

“I knew I could work as a heel because I’d watched so much of Ray Stevens and Pat Patterson and ‘Superstar’ Billy Graham and The Great Malenko,” Hogan said. “They’d chop, kick and beat the crap out of you, but then they’d backpedal, cross their heart, and drop to their knees the moment the babyface would make his comeback.”

Having studied some of wrestling’s finest heels, Hogan was confident in his ability to deliver. However, he admitted there was significant hesitation about abandoning his beloved red-and-yellow persona.

“For me, the problem was the timing. I didn’t know if that was the right timing to do it,” he said. “It wasn’t as intense as it was from ’89 to ’91, but there were still people who loved me as a babyface. I was so focused during that stretch with doing movies, and I still wanted to come back in the red and yellow. Eric [Bischoff] had mentioned the idea to me, and I thought I could be a really intense heel. But turning, after all we’d been through to reach that point, it really concerned me.”

Despite his initial reservations, Hogan’s decision to align with Scott Hall and Kevin Nash and attack Randy Savage proved revolutionary. The turn shocked the wrestling world and is now hailed as one of the most significant moments in the history of professional wrestling.

Which Infamous WrestleMania Injury Story Did Hulk Hogan Stand By?

Hulk Hogan retold the story of how he got his black eye before WrestleMania 9 and reaffirmed that he received the injury in a jet-skiing accident and not by having a fistfight with “Macho Man” Randy Savage, which is the popular legend surrounding Hogan’s 1993 shiner. Hogan said that despite what Savage had told others, he did indeed get his black eye after falling off a jet-ski and subsequently being hit in the face by it as it spun out of control.