Hogan's buddy and a genuinely bad worker, with plenty of awful gimmicks as mentioned. should be easy to see how that would do it!
i'm in the camp that thinks he was approaching "decent" in early 1990 or thereabouts...he at least seemed more motivated. that disappeared for good after the accident though, and his 1993 comeback was especially brutal; Judy Bagwell's memory is correct on that promo, as he was going for sympathy but came off so poorly that someone in the crowd shouted "KILL YOURSELF!"
I think he was fairly average inring with bouts of above average at points in 1989. I would say there are no points where he stands out as particularly bad in the sea of crap that was 1980s WWF. He absolutely sucked post injury.
I think if people went back and actually watched the Dream Team or his 1989 run they would have a generally better opinion of him.