Remembering Hulk Hogan 1953-2025

Well,

hello everyone and welcome to Faces and Heels,

your podcast for professional wrestling here on the KB Radio Network.

I am your host,

Kevin Reed,

and today is a sad day in professional wrestling to a lot of people as the wrestling community mourns the loss of the icon,

the legend.

the immortal hulk hogan who passed away at the ripe young age of 71 years old yes hulk hogan has moved on to the big wrestling ring in the sky this was a episode that i'm

be honest with you i was kind of on the fence with talking about it but cooler minds prevailed because i had my opinions of of hulk hogan

And

I'm torn because it's a situation where my love for professional wrestling,

how I came to love it,

and what got me to watch it as a youngster was Hulk Hogan.

Him in his initial run in the WWF at the time,

and that's what drew me to professional wrestling.

His feuds with...

andre the giant you know him teaming up with mr t and uh the feud with uh rowdy roddy piper and the mega powers uniting and you know things of that nature that's what drew me to professional wrestling and that's why i love professional wrestling to this day and it is because of this man and

then there's the other half of me it's the other half of me you know that old

Expression you shouldn't meet your heroes,

and I never met

Hulk Hogan personally face to face

But that expression it goes true when it comes to him because as the older we got as time passed on we got to peel the layers back and know the real

Hulk Hogan and

You found out that he's a racist.

He's a liar and he said he was everything else in

I'd grew

to despise the man so it was it was kind of hard to come to grips with this show like should i even do the show should i even talk about hulk hogan after all that he said and did that came to light in the past what 20 years and

it's it's kind of disturbing well not kinda it's disturbing and so how i fixed it in my mind whether it's right or wrong maybe you could tell me

but this is how i fixed it in my mind i will always be a fan of hulk hogan i can't take it away i can't take away his iconic status as a professional wrestler the the

things that he did in the ring and the promos that he did the epic hill turn that took place at wcw and and so on and So

I can't take away all of those iconic moments that we got to experience because of Hulk

Hogan.

But Terry

Bollea, on the other hand,

I can't stand him.

I despise him as a human being.

I'm just going to celebrate Hulk Hogan.

Now,

it's not to shy away from the person that he is outside of the ring.

But

I can't take away the fact of

Hulk Hogan being one of,

if not the greatest professional wrestlers of all time.

As much as it pains me to say,

you know,

you can't take away what that man did in the ring and for the professional wrestling business.

It is iconic,

man.

We wouldn't be here today.

We wouldn't be experiencing.

The joy of

WWE and AEW and TNA and,

you know,

New Japan and all this other good stuff.

I don't think this would be around if

Hulk Hogan was not the iconic figure that he was in the

80s. Where professional wrestling just took off globally.

You know,

it wasn't just a territorial thing.

It became global.

And it was global.

because of hulk hogan is is similar to the nba for you basketball fans uh the nba

was a good league,

a good product,

until

Michael Jordan came along.

Michael Jordan just took the NBA to a whole other stratosphere.

It became a global phenomenon because of Michael Jordan.

And so,

Hulk Hogan is,

I guess you could say,

the Michael Jordan of professional wrestling.

Now,

there are better wrestlers.

You would never hear me say on...

any any uh show blog whatever that he's the greatest wrestler ever no he's not even a good one he was never good in the ring his in-ring work was not the greatest he had four moves

four that's it but what made hulk hogan special was the four moves that he made special he he was able to drag out a match that was so entertaining.

that you couldn't help but acknowledge the fact that he is the GOAT,

you know?

I think back to probably his greatest match,

and this is just my humble opinion.

Everybody has a different one.

Some may say the match he had with

Macho Man Randy Savage or the match he had with

Ric Flair back in the day.

But my all-time favorite match,

and I think it's his greatest match,

was the Wrestlemania 18 I believe with

Hollywood Hulk Hogan versus The Rock.

That was the greatest

Hulk Hogan match I've ever seen.

It's probably one of the best

Wrestlemania matches I've ever seen.

Not the best,

but one of the best Wrestlemania matches I've ever seen.

To see a double heel turn,

or a double turn I should say,

take place right there on the spot in that moment and...

for Hogan and The Rock to fully acknowledge the moment.

The pop that that crowd gave in Toronto for Hulk Hogan was epic,

man.

It's still to this day.

That's one of the only matches I go back on YouTube and watch.

And watch it in its entirety.

I love that match.

And that's the only Hogan match I would go back and watch multiple times.

It was just cinema,

man.

It was beautiful to watch that match.

Today,

I decided we're going to go through the history of Hulk Hogan and go through his career.

And unfortunately,

we're going to touch in on some of his life,

some of Terry's shenanigans as well.

But we're not going to skimp.

point we're gonna talk about the man you know as he passed away and it is sad now you know no matter how i feel about him personally and you know the things that he stood for and whatnot that i vehemently

disagree with i just uh i feel compelled to talk about him so we're gonna talk about the immortal hulk hogan

who passed away today on july the 24th just a couple of weeks shy of his

72nd birthday he was born on august the 11th 1953 in augusta georgia under the giving name of terry bellaire and terry wanted to be a professional wrestler since the age of 16 he began watching professional wrestling than going

to,

uh...

shows at his local Sportatorium and one day he got old you know used to have cards baseball guards football cards and whatnot

I don't know if they still do but I used to collect football cards,

but that's besides the point he had wrestling cards and one of the cards he had was of superstar

Billy Graham and

He fell in love with that for see he fell in love with the way superstar Billy Graham looked

and he wanted to emulate that look and so he started you know working out and doing everything he could to emulate that look and so while he was doing that he also dabbled in uh being

a musician he used to play the bass guitar for several local bands in his uh while he was in high school and whatnot in community college.

And so he was,

he was.

really deep into it you know to the point where two other local musicians around the area where he lived they formed a band uh ruckus

back in 1976.

And so they started doing gigs at local clubs and wherever they can get the gigs at.

And all the while,

during his spare time,

Terry would work out at a local gym in

Tampa Bay.

And so he would lift and do all that good stuff.

And many wrestlers from that area would go to that gym.

to work out and they noticed old terry got to know him a little bit and he told him that he's in the band they're performing at such and such club and so they'll come and see him at the club so uh two of the individuals that

would come would be the briscoe brothers i'm pretty sure a lot of people who uh were around for the attitude error of the wwf or wwe you remember jerry briscoe

It was him and his brother.

And so they would go see this band,

and they looked at the bass guitar player,

and they're like,

hey,

that dude looks good.

He looks like he can actually perform,

you know.

Let's see what he got.

So they invited him to train at their wrestling school or whatever,

and one thing led to another.

The Bershko brothers asked him.

to try out wrestling and he agreed you know being a big fan of it so terry he quit the band he began training and the rest as they say is history um he started in one training session i think it was his first one if

i read it right he he was in the ring with hero matasaka and he broke terry villaria's League.

the first training section and so he had to do ten weeks of rehab and

When he returned after the ten weeks

He asked the briscoes like look

I would do this,

but I don't want to work with hero that that's not happening

That's not happening.

And so they agreed and they

Had him work with other people in the promotion.

It's so

While working for this small promotion,

this is where he met Brutus the Beefcake,

who became his lifelong friend.

The two,

as we all know,

end up working together again in WWF for a good while.

And I believe,

did Brutus the Beefcake end up going to

WC... I think he...

I think so.

I think everybody ended up going to

WCW at some point.

But anywho,

around this time...

Uh...

he was trying to come up with a name for his character in the ring and the big show on television around this era late 70s was of course the incredible hawk and what it was uh

i believe terry was on this local television show the talk show or whatever it was and lou farigno was on the show with them is in

you know lou ferigno played the hawk on that show and he's looking at lou ferigno he like yeah you playing the hawk you know because terry dropped him he was bigger than him you know terry bella he was six seven 295 pounds he had the 24 inch biceps and so he's like i'm

bigger than you i deserve to be the hawk so that's where the name the hawk came from so uh he

began going by the name Terry the Hulk Boulder and he sometimes also wrestled under the name Sterling Golden which I don't know where that came from I guess because the blonde hair but whatever the case may be uh Terry the Hulk Boulder was his real first

official wrestling gimmick name so we transport to December the 1st 1971

I was actually born during this time so now it starts

the world's starting to make sense to me and so we got at least this part of his story uh december of 1979 terry won the first professional wrestling championship the nwa southeastern

heavyweight championship in the northern division uh remember around this time there were territories there weren't they you didn't have just

promotions you didn't have just wwe aew tna and so on and so forth there were promotions all over

because down here was mid-south uh down here in the new orleans area but anyways that title was only recognized in alabama and tennessee it wasn't right it was wasn't recognized anywhere else but just a month later january of 1980 he ended up dropping the title to bob armstrong um

after that he briefly wrestled in georgia championship wrestling that territory and

And then he got the phone call that changed his life and millions of other lives around the world.

When former NWA world champion Terry Funk introduced Terry to the WWF owner and promoter,

Vincent J.

McMahon.

Yes,

the father,

not Vinnie Mac.

But he introduced him to Big Vince there,

who was impressed with...

terry's charisma and uh his his physical prowess and whatnot so mcmahon wanted him to use an irish name and so he gave him the last name hogan but he also wanted him to dye his hair red so he can go full irish gimmick here but

around this time and this was uh 1980 1979 1980 um

Terry told him,

look,

my hair is already falling out.

I don't want to use dye.

I'll be bald by the end of the year.

So I'm just going to keep it blonde,

and I'll be a blonde Irish.

And there you had it,

the birth of Hulk

Hogan. So that's how we arrived at this name.

Terry wrestled his first match in

WWE when he defeated Harry

Valdez.

uh what that was november the

17th on championship wrestling he made his first appearance at madison square garden in december of 1979 when he defeated ted debiocity and he defeated him not with the leg drop but

with a bear hug that was his finishing move that was his finishing move back in the day and he beat ted debiocity

What made that interesting,

after the match,

Terry was so appreciative to Ted Deveosity,

and he told him that he owed him one.

And he did end up repaying it years later.

It took him some time,

but years later,

when Ted Deveosity returned to WWF under the moniker

The Million Dollar Man,

and he got that win back on

Hulk Hogan.

So,

during this time,

Hogan was still doing other promotions.

He was still working with other promotions.

You know,

this was before it was taboo now.

You know,

the forbidden door or whatever.

But he was working in New Japan.

He did that for about five years from 1980 to 1985.

The American Wrestling Association from

1981 to 1983.

and then

he returned to the WWF in 1983 and that run lasted till 1993 and now this go around uh when he returned in 1983 he wasn't under the tutelage of Vincent

McMahon now it was Vincent

McMahon now this is the uh Vinnie Mac that we all know and love after he bought

the company from his father in 1982 and he planned to expand the the company no not just be a territory but a nationwide promotion and we fast forward

40 years later now is global now is universal so uh you can say what you want about vince uh vince had a vision and look at it now and he hand-picked hulk hogan

to be the company's centerpiece you know due to his charisma and this recognition you know name recognition i should say so uh that was a good choice to kind of put the company on hawk hogan's back at the time so hogan he returned to television and

began a feud with none other than the iron sheik and if anybody follows uh uh pro wrestling for any amount of time you know that

The Iron Sheik did not like

Hulk Hogan and I mean

I'm putting it mildly I'm I'm giving it this is probably the nicest

description i can give the iron cheek uh in his feelings towards hawk hogan uh god rest his soul he passed away a couple years back as well but my god if they were to link up in heaven it's

gonna be a throw down the loser the loser leaves heaven match i i don't know man i think hogan going to hell because it's iron cheek got some disdain for i mean literally to his dying day

Literally,

the day

Iron Sheik passed away,

he tweeted,

Hulk Hogan.

He never,

never hid his feelings about Hulk Hogan.

But in any event,

that was his first initial feud.

When he pinned the Iron Sheik to become the WWF World Heavyweight Champion,

that was kind of funky the way it was.

And now...

it wasn't for all of us watching at home but behind the scenes you see burt bat uh backland was supposed to be the iron sheik's opponent that night for the for the title it didn't go that way next thing you know there

was a last minute replacement and it was none other than hawk who won the title and he became champion by way of being the first man to escape

the camel clutch which was the iron sheik's finishing move and that made it even worse you know because finishing moves are protected at least they supposed to be not so much these days because my god man if if i watch another premium live event where

we get multiple kickouts of multiple finishing moves i'm gonna lose my mind because they're no no longer finishing moves i see more and this is this is my rant

portion of the show it has nothing to do with no cold but it is i see more finishes with a surprise roll-up than i actually see from a finishing it is driving me insane as

a wrestling fan it drives me insane the only finishing moves lately that i've seen that have been protected is

the RKO,

the Riptide,

and that's about it.

Everything else I have seen get kicked out of.

I haven't seen nobody's finisher be devastating.

You remember the Razor's Edge from

Razor Ramon or Scott Hall?

That was protected.

Nobody ever kicked out of that,

ever.

The Jack Knight Powerbomb?

Never.

you know uh the jackknife uh suplex from goldberg never i don't i don't get it man i just i just don't get wrestling these days but anywho's back back to mr uh

hawk hogan after he won his championship uh gorilla monsoon who was on commentary at the time he made the proclamation and uh no truer words have been spoken

from the commentary desk on any promotion in history when he uttered the words hawk-a-mania is here and boy was it that was the birth of hawk-a-mania and my god he took off from there you know hawk um uh

hulk hogan started calling his fans the hawk-a-maniacs uh that's why i consider myself a hawk-a-maniac not so much today but i did back

did back then um this is where we got the the uh model the mission statement of hulkamania where it's it training save you say your prayers and eat your vitamins you know all that was became

the mantra for little boys and girls around that time you know and then there's the epic hulking up hulking up baby that's where that's where the crowd gets energized

Hulk is getting beat down by his opponent,

and eventually he stops.

You know,

he stops selling.

And he's shaking his head.

He's shaking his arm.

Looks like he's having a seizure in the ring.

And he's slowly standing up.

The opponent is still punching him,

trying to get him down.

And he's hulking up,

man.

And once he gets to that stage,

you know,

it's over.

It's nothing you can do.

You can ram a Mack truck into him.

the mack truck don't stand a chance so that that was that you know it is the point adam you

Then there's three punches,

an Irish rip,

a big boot,

and a running leg drop match over.

That's it.

That's the four.

That's the moves.

That's it.

That was it.

But for some strange reason,

that worked for

35 years,

or however long it was that he was doing it.

It was flawless,

man.

But professional wrestling took off at this point.

You know,

they had their poster child.

They had their hero.

They had their guy.

They can stand behind it,

kind of legitimize this sport or whatever you want to describe it as.

You know,

you had a face that you can put on cereal boxes,

a face you can put on toys,

a face that you can put on a cartoon,

which is what we got.

We got,

I think it was,

what was it called?

Rockin'

Wrestling or something like that.

Yeah,

you had that Saturday morning cartoon.

You had the first WrestleMania to take place in 1985 where he teamed up with Mr.

You know,

you're like,

oh,

man.

That's cool.

That's cool there.

You had

Saturday Night Main events and all this other good stuff.

You got...

Him on the cover of Sports Illustrated and being on a Tonight Show and,

you know,

co-hosting Saturday Night Live.

It was just,

it was phenomenal,

man.

It took off like a rocket.

And

Hulk Hogan was the man.

He was the man.

You got to WrestleMania when he actually picked up Andre the Giant in body slam.

And at the time,

I thought that was the most phenomenal thing on God's green earth,

you know,

because I never seen nobody pick up

Andre the Giant and body slam.

But as time goes on and you do some research,

you know,

YouTube exists.

You know that

Hulk Hogan wasn't the first person to body slam

Andre the Giant.

But it was epic at the time.

It was so epic.

And I loved every minute of it because.

At the time,

I was geeking out for Hulk Hogan,

man.

The immovable object going against whatever.

I forgot how they promoted it.

But anyways,

it was a main event that was as big as Andre the Giant.

And for him to pick up Andre the Giant,

body slam him,

do the leg drop,

get the win,

just an amazing.

an amazing moment in wrestling and so we fast forward a little bit to another amazing moment and that was the mega pop and i don't know what's more intriguing about the mega mega pop was it these

two superstars arguably the two biggest superstars in their era with hulk hogan and the macho man randy savage teaming up i don't know if that was

the greatness of it all or was it the behind the scenes of it all you know the mega powers exploding uh that later played out but if you know the true backstory of what really took place man i

would i am surprised that uh randy savage didn't kill hawk he was randy savage did not like him but they teamed up together um later they

exploded over uh elizabeth miss elizabeth uh because of jealousy and it come to find out that macho man randy savage in real life it was really jealous you know real possessive of miss elizabeth you know and he

suspected hulk hogan of sleeping with miss elizabeth now i don't think this has ever been proven nothing i researched that said that this actually took

place or or not but it wouldn't shock me if it did but i can't confirm nor deny it fit and that led to them exploding outside the ring and inside there and we had an epic epic showdown

between those two uh hulk hogan ended up winning that match and i believe that was at the royal rumble that wasn't a WrestleMania.

I think that was a Royal Rumble that they end up fighting or did they end up?

No,

no,

no.

They did fight at WrestleMania.

I think it started at the Royal Rumble because

I think Hogan.

eliminated savage or something like that i can't remember i just watched a documentary on this that's but i can't remember how that went but anywho they did end up meeting up at wrestlemania and hogan beat him again for a second time uh for the title because uh savage was the champion at the time and

so that was that um he ended up finishing finishing out that run

with the wwf in 1993 he went back to new japan wrestling and uh did a couple of matches there um for about a year i think he wrestled uh muda if i'm not mistaken uh he

was all for retiring he was actually going to retire and wcw came calling then now this This is when WCW started to take off,

bitch off,

became the president.

of wcw or whatever his title was and uh he wanted hogan he needed a big name to rival the wwf and that was their goal their goal was to take down ww that

that was that was the whole mission of wcw so what would be the knife twisting in the back well not a knife this is more of a machete

maybe even a chainsaw in the back it would be their biggest star the star that made them what they are to jump over to the rival and make that company just as big let's

hire hawk hogan so hawk hogan was working on his tv show at the time thunder in paradise which is a horrible show as big as a hawk hogan fan as i was back then

I could not watch that show.

That show was bad.

But anyway,

the decision for him was he wanted to wrestle

Ric Flair,

something that fans and everybody in the wrestling community around that time wanted to see.

Ric Flair was in WCW.

So he decided to go and sign with WCW.

I think

At one point,

they were going to link up in WWF,

but Vince McMahon didn't pull the trigger with it.

So it was a big disappointment for a lot of people,

including me,

because I was hot as fish grease that that match never took place in WWF.

But we get the opportunity to see it in WCW.

Hogan signed in 1994,

and he appeared with Jimmy Hart.

as his manager at the time.

In his debut match,

Togan won the WCW World Heavyweight Championship.

Are you shocked?

When he defeated Ric Flair in a dream match at Bash at the Beach and that kicked off a feud that saw them link up again at Clash of Champions where

Flair won by countout.

which means he didn't win the title.

And so they had a rubble match in a steel cage where

Ric Flair's career was on the line.

And then you had Mr.

T as the special guest referee in that match.

And,

of course,

Hulk Hogan won that match.

All this helped WCW,

but they didn't quite get there yet.

They weren't at the goal they wanted to overtake WWF.

So.

In 1996,

at Bash at the Beach,

we got a six-man tag team match.

You had the Outsiders,

who were Kevin Nash and

Scott Hall,

who had just defected from

WWF and came over to WCW.

They took on four members of WCW because the whole angle here was that Kevin Nash and Scott Hall,

they were plants.

You know,

they were sent there.

by Vince McMahon to ruin the company and blah blah blah blah and they uh they always said in promos leading up to this match that there's a third man who's the third man and during the match we see that uh Kevin Nash and Scott Hall they're getting up a hand they beating these uh the

other team up and Hogan starts to come out he comes out down the ring

and he's like all right hogan hogan's gonna fight for the company he's gonna he's gonna help wcw out randy savage is on the ground and you see hogan hit the ropes

and do the leg drop on Randy Savage.

And everybody was like,

what just happened?

What just happened here?

What is going on?

Did

Hall and Nash turn face or something?

Because the last thing on anybody's mind is Hulk Hogan turning heel.

There's no way.

And sure enough.

for the first time in what

20 years because he was a heel before he got to wwf you know in the early part of his career uh he was a heel as terry the hulk boulder and uh sterling uh golden whatever his name was yeah

he was a heel it wasn't until vince mcmahon got him and turned him into a face as a baby face to be the face of the company and so

This was like,

what?

And

Hogan dropped the promo that they are the new world order of professional wrestling,

the NWO.

And it was off and running.

WCW took over.

83 weeks.

83 weeks in a row.

They were the number one wrestling promotion.

And all because.

of hulk hogan who now goes under hollywood hulk hogan wearing the black and white you know uh eventually winning the championship spraying nwo on that belt and it was just it was amazing and you sit back and you think like

i said i gotta keep saying this no matter how you feel about hulk hogan you can't deny his impact on professional wrestling he single-handedly

within a 15 year time span brought two rival wrestling promotions to prominence to number one he he made wwf what it was as the made them the number one promotion in the world and

turned right around wcw a nothing promotion a little territorial promotion at one point and turned them into the number one promotion.

He did it.

I can't take that away.

He did it.

Because up to that point,

WCW was struggling.

They were struggling bad.

I mean,

they were doing all right.

But as far as being the number one company,

no,

no.

They didn't have a shot until

Hulk Hogan got there.

And so his ring of terror.

It lasted for about three years as the NWO did their thing.

It was entertaining for a while,

and then the bottom fell off when everybody became NWO.

It wasn't WCW no more.

It was NWO,

and it got boring.

It got stale,

and eventually

WWE, as it became around that time,

took back the number one spot.

One thing that did come out good,

one of his better matches in WCW,

as far as I can remember,

was,

of course,

the match between Goldberg.

When Goldberg won the WCW

World Heavyweight Championship on Nitro.

That was crazy within his own right,

because why Nitro?

That is a pay-per-view match in the making.

That is money.

but they gave it away for free.

I'm not mad at them because I didn't want to spend $50 on a pay-per-view anyway.

Thank you,

Eric Bischoff.

But it was an epic moment for the company.

Even in a loss,

Hogan still found a way to put the company over.

So from that moment on,

and I think maybe a year,

probably could have been less than a year after he lost to Goldberg,

he kind of reverted back.

to the babyface hogan that we know the real american hogan that we know and uh kind of finish it finished it off and what that was

2000 i think the year 2000 that's when we got that uh hogan and what's his name vince russo debacle once again that bash at the beach uh i don't know what it is about bass at the

bash at the beach but it's always something epic that takes place with Hogan either he wins the title turns heel or curses out the head of creative on the microphone one of the two but that was the last

very last appearance of

Hulk Hogan in WCW.

And,

you know,

it is monumental just to say that,

but it wasn't that long after that

Vince McMahon bought WCW and that was the last appearance for anybody at WCW.

But after his departure from WCW,

he did some,

he wasn't really wrestling,

you know.

until

2002 and Vince McMahon brought in

W, uh,

he brought in

NWO, which was the greatest symbol of Vince McMahon only cares about money because all three men,

all three men left

WWE on bad terms when they,

when they,

uh,

initially left,

uh,

Scott Hall and,

uh,

Kevin Nash,

they left under crazy circumstances.

And then,

of course,

Hulk Hogan,

you had the steroid trial that pitted those two guys against each other and all this.

I didn't really go into all that because

I'm trying to stay positive for this episode.

But there's a lot that took place behind the scenes of that that led to

Hulk Hogan leaving the

WWF the first run.

But they came back in 2002.

And I'm going to tell you,

bro,

once again,

this is what led up to the rock match at WrestleMania.

Initially,

initially,

it was supposed to be Stone Cold Steve Austin versus Hollywood Hawk Hogan at WrestleMania.

You know,

the two biggest stars at the time.

Steve Austin declined it.

He ended up wrestling Scott Hall.

at wrestlemania that year uh something to that effect i forgot who said who who didn't want to wrestle who it depends on who you asked on what day but it didn't take place so that morphed into option b hollywood

hulk hogan taking on the rock and man like i said before despite the fact that hogan was supposed to be the heel in that match and the rock came in as the babyface

the crowd turned the crowd cheered for hogan so hard i i'm gonna tell you bro when i watched it when i first watched that i think that was what 2002 when i first watched that i i had tears in my eyes because i was thinking back thinking back of

me as a little boy watching wrestling And I remember when Hogan,

it was this storyline that ran.

back in the 80s where hogan was going to retire and all this here and i was depressed and they had announced that hogan was going to uh speak to everybody on i think it was a saturday night main event or some one of those shows i think yeah it was saturday night main event and

he came out and it was somber the way he was talking it didn't he say like yes everybody want to know if i'm gonna retire.

Hell no,

I'm not ready.

And the way he did,

I remember running out and telling my dad,

and I had tears in my eyes just telling my dad,

he's not ready.

He's still going to wrestle.

And I just thought back to those moments,

man.

Feel like a fool now knowing that he was a moron,

but that's neither here nor there.

But it.

it brought back those memories when that crowd turned because that crowd had the same affection before hulk hogan that i had and it was like man somebody feels my pain even though he's a heel and

i enjoyed him as a heel he was great as a heel uh but who can remember the great uh say your prayers eat your vitamins hulk hogan man that was that was epic

And that match was epic as well as far as storytelling.

That was the best story.

I'm not saying it was the best technically sound match in wrestling history.

No,

it wasn't.

You look at the two participants there.

As much as people love The Rock,

The Rock was not a banger in the ring.

You know,

he was decent,

but he wasn't tearing the roof off of a stadium.

So,

in any event,

it was a cool match.

and

Hogan turned back to...

face i should say and had a nice run for about a i don't know what about a year uh when he was there

year and a half maybe i forgot how long it was it wasn't long uh but uh he left did some other endeavors and he ended up coming back in 2005 and this go around this this go around uh this is when he was inducted into

the wwe hall of fame he had his own reality show hogan knows best and all that all the good stuff and this is when we had the feud with Shawn Michaels that

it's the stuff of legend this was supposed to be a three match feud that dad hogan turned into one match because he he was older and he felt he couldn't go for a three match arc and

so this angered his angered sean michaels and so they end up having a match at summer slam which is coming up in a couple of weeks here and but uh that year's summer slam where

Shawn Michaels oversold every move that

Hogan did to a hilarious effect,

man.

It was so cartoonish and silly.

It's embarrassing,

really,

but it's funny at the same time.

He was that mad at Hogan,

but he ended up making them both look like fools,

if anything.

But nothing really to talk about on his run of his

WWE.

wrestling I guess you can say because that was pretty much it um we fast forward to 2009 and this is when he went over to TNA TNA was trying to be the new

WCW and overtake

WWF or WWE and they wanted to make a mark so let's bring in Hulk let's bring in Hogan let's see if he can be uh

three for three here in promotions and and make this company a big deal like he did for wwf at the time and wcw and so hogan didn't really come to be a wrestler he really came to be the

head of creative or whatever head of the company or co-head or whatever he brought bish off over with him and it was basically wcw 2.0

When they came over there,

they decided to move Impact,

which is the name of their flagship show,

move that to Monday nights and make it three hours to compete directly with Monday Night Raw.

And that was a dumpster fire of a decision.

It didn't work out at all.

The talent he brought in over there at

TNA, old,

washed up

WWF.

WCW stars that could barely move around the ring it was just it was a dumpster fire and ultimately he ended up leaving

Dixie Carter was left wondering what to do with the company Dixie Carter of course was the owner of TNA at the time and she didn't know what she was doing and Eric Bischoff and Hogan didn't know what they were doing as well wrestlers wrestle it should not be

his of creative and whatnot i mean triple h god bless him he's all right but he has a team he has a team with this this this this was bad in tna and this was around the time i was trying to get into tn but

it didn't it didn't work out and so for the fourth time in his career in 2014 hulk hogan returned to ww and

He made his first in-ring appearance and he hyped up the WWE Network around that time.

He co-hosted

WrestleMania. I think that was WrestleMania 30.

That was here in New Orleans.

The one that Undertaker lost it.

That was devastating.

He co-hosted that and you all remember that when he called the Superdome the Silverdome.

And Steve Austin clowned him for it and whatnot.

But yeah,

you had that.

It was a lot of appearances.

He didn't really wrestle when he came back.

He came out at WrestleMania the next year,

31,

with

NWO. That's when Sting was wrestling Triple

H in a regrettable match.

I wish Sting would have went over,

but of course Triple H couldn't allow that.

But.

Whatever.

So,

you got that,

and...

Then the bombshell dropped the bombshell dropped

In 2015 everything that could have went wrong for Hulk Hogan did go wrong when Terry Bollea

This is the Terry Bollea section,

but he went full

Racist he not only that you had the sex tape bleep,

you know that that came out then we got the recordings of

Him calling his daughter's boyfriend the hard R,

N-word,

the hard R.

That rolled off his tongue way too well.

You had that.

You had the WWE taking him out of the Hall of Fame and stripping him of his Legends contract and whatnot.

It was a mess.

He was just shamed.

Shamed he was on the video game

WWE 2k they took him off the game.

It was all he was just being erased from history and then something happened in 2018 he returned for a time to the WWE they re-extended him into the Hall of Fame

He even got inducted for a second time into the Hall of Fame

When the WWE inducted the NWO,

the New World,

all the members into the Hall of Fame.

That was with Nash Hall and

X-Pac along with Hogan.

He made some appearances on a lot of programs before WWE.

But what really kind of held that up a little bit was the pandemic.

When that hit in 2020,

kind of...

kind of went missing for a while then came back he co-hosted wrestlemania 37 uh appeared on uh the 30th anniversary of raw i think that was one of the anniversaries whatever uh also at the 40th anniversary as well um

and and the last time we saw him on wwe television was the debut on netflix

just this past January when he came out and got booed to death.

I mean,

he could have passed away that day,

and I would have known why.

It would have been understandable.

I mean,

I have never heard so much heat come from a crowd when Hulk Hogan's music hit,

and he limped out the hallway.

It was...

I was embarrassed for them,

but I felt their pain.

I felt those people's pain.

Because up to this point,

people were just tired of Hulk Hogan.

You know?

The political stuff aside,

because that's what the majority of the people were doing.

It wasn't the racist stuff,

because people got over that.

But for some strange reason,

I don't know how.

But the political stuff,

you know,

him backing Trump and all this here,

that just killed it.

That was the nail in the coffin for the majority of...

the wrestling community and unfortunately that is the last visual reference we have for hawk hogan it's kind of fitting it's kind of poetic to be honest with you uh

for a man that helped make this business what it was that that created uh this phenomenon known as professional wrestling and

it's like the saying goes you you can die hero or live long enough to become the villain and unfortunately he lived long enough to become the villain and i don't know how you view hulk hogan do you view him as hulk hogan or do you view him as terry bella i i don't know uh

me personally i look at them both individually i look at them both i guess in my psycho mind

they're two different people because i don't think hulk hogan's a racist i don't think how hulk hogan is uh a moron but i do think terry bella is you know god rest his soul i just can't rock with him but uh hulk hogan he

has given me way too many good memories throughout my childhood and adulthood for me to just say poo poo on you know what i'm saying so uh

i gotta give props what props do uh wish he would have kind of changed his tune a bit

you know going out the door uh amid his wrongs going out the door because he's also a liar he if you listen to his interviews they are migraine inducing i mean stuff just don't add up the math don't be maffin when he talks you know some of the stuff he see but

it is what it is you

RIP to Terry

Hulk Hogan

Balea

I would love to know what is your favorite Hulk Hogan match?

Were you a Hulk Hogan fan?

Are you like me?

Did he draw you to professional wrestling and how did you feel coming up to the end of his life,

the last 20 years of Hulk Hogan?

Do you feel he tarnished his legacy and whatnot?

I'm not going to say he tarnished his legacy.

You can't take away the stuff that he did in his career,

but you also can't forget the things that he did outside of the ring as well.

But I would love to know your thoughts about Hulk Hogan.

Email the show,

kbradiopodcasts at gmail.com.

You can also search for the show on all social media platforms.

Just search for the KB Radio Network.

Don't forget about YouTube,

ladies and gentlemen.

Subscribe to the KB Radio Network channel.

And smash that like button if you don't mind.

Don't forget about the five stars,

the reviews,

and sharing this show.

If you're listening on Apple Podcasts,

Spotify,

iHeartRadio,

wherever you are currently listening to Faces and Heels here on the KB Radio

Network. Everybody,

thank you for joining me for this remembrance of the legend,

the icon,

the immortal

Hulk

Hogan.

Until next time,

say your prayers,

eat your vitamins,

and I'll catch you on the next one.

Remembering Hulk Hogan 1953-2025

About this episode