Hulk Hogan

[Grimmas]

Discuss here.

[Loss]

This is an artistic list so I don't feel the need to throw Hogan a bone. He definitely has some good matches in his career, but he was put in a position to do so on so many occasions that it's only natural he would sometimes. You can credit him almost singlehandedly for creating the dilemma we have for discussing matches that are financially successful but are crap. That's not to say every big match he has had has been crap - far from it. But I think he's the antithesis of what this poll is supposed to represent, which is why I won't vote for him.

[Phil Schneider]

I don't see it, he has had some fun matches but crazy popular but artistically pretty weak shouldn't get you on a list. Journey wouldn't make a top 100 bands list

[goodhelmet]

I liken him to Inoki. He has some classics under his belt but the unbelievable amount of crap that has made tape make it hard for Hogan to make the list.

[Alan4L]

Same feelings as you guys. There are way too many incredible wrestlers to be using a spot on Hogan because he was a megastar.

[MJH]

For Loss' first and last sentence, there's a good chance I (and, judging from above, a lot of people) won't include Hogan. I'm not sure what the best comparison would be, but this is a literary list and he's the ultimate James Patterson. That being said, however, it's not as though Hogan is Hogan because Vince wanted him to be Hogan and gave him the late-'99-HHH push until he became Hogan... and he's so superlative in those areas that it's also kinda hard for me to ignore him entirely. I don't think throwing him in the lower quarter is "throwing him a bone", as Loss said, and there's an equally good chance I'll place him around there.

[Grimmas]

His selling and in ring charisma is way up there, so there is a chance he makes it somewhere.

[Dylan Waco]

Hogan wouldn't make my list, but I think id rate him over Dusty.

[BillThompson]

Hogan is a guy I've come around on. I used to think he was one of the worst workers ever, probably a residual effect from growing up being influenced by Scott Keith. Now, he's still not going to make my list but there were times when he was a really good in-ring worker. I just watched his SNME match with Bob Orton Jr., and watching him carry Orton to what should have been a great match really was something. Hogan is far better than his reputation, but he's not top 100 material.

[ohtani's jacket]

The idea of Hogan carrying Orton would blow a few minds.

[JerryvonKramer]

Choshu brought that almost unparalleled ability to make everything feel important. Wherever he was seemed to be the eye of the storm

his infectious energy and charisma turned everything to gold for a while.

Hogan's ability to electrify a promotion and make things feel more important should count for something. He did it not once, but THREE times in his career for three different companies.

 

His ability to connect with a crowd is significent. He doesn't have the earthiness of Bruno or even of Austin, but he wasn't that sort of hero. He was larger-than-life, an action figure come to life in the age of He-Man.

 

He also made matches feel BIGGER than imaginable. Mania III, Mania VI, Mania 18. I'm not talking about promos and hype packages, I'm talking about those early match moments. The staredowns. The genuine intensity. People think that's easy -- watching shit like Cena vs. The Rock shows you how much it isn't. Hogan does that stuff better than practically anyone. And it's a rare quality.

 

But those are the obvious things. What else?

 

An underrated aspect of his work -- which has been repeated so often at this point, it's almost a cliche -- is his selling and ability to generate sympathy during a heel's heat segment. He never stopped being good at this, even if he really got lazy with it circa 94-5. The more Bob Backlund I've watched, the more and more I've come to appreciate just what Hogan was able to do well for so long. Yes, the formula became staid and predictable, but look how effectively he drew sympathy from crowds who must have known deep down that he was going to win. He was able to wring a sense of danger from the most contrived of narratives. And he did that through selling.

 

His timing was good too. He knew when to time a hope spot. He knew when to do the comeback. I think people forget that Hogan actually worked with an awful lot of stiffs during his time, but he was able to extract the maximum possible heat from them.

 

Finally, while I'd never say Hogan was that good on offense, in his AWA run and 84-6 sort of time, he does have a real intensity to him. That gets a bit sanitized and watered down as we roll into the late 80s and early 90s. But even in 90 and 91 he has some decent stuff with Earthquake and Slaughter, and I really like that match in Japan with Hansen.

 

-------

 

So all-in-all, I think Hogan warrants a place on the list for being an extremely effective working babyface.

 

I can't imagine a world where I'd rank someone like Low Ki above Hogan. Low Ki might be better than Hogan at working the mat, doing kicks, coming off the top rope, or whatever -- but the things Hogan could do that he can't (see above) are basically just more important to what I value in wrestling.

 

I don't know where exactly Hogan will go. I hated him as a kid, and he still has a lot of matches where he annoys me a good bit, and his pre-NWO WCW run still makes my stomach turn over. But he was too good at what he did not to rank somewhere.

 

He'll be in the 50-100 half for me. Above Backlund for sure, but below Bruno and probably Austin too.

 

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Finally, I don't really agree with the artistic vs. commercial artist point.

 

If I was to make an analogy, if your Ivan Putskis or Chief Jay Strongbows were like your Phil Collins (ie. commerically successful, but devoid of artistic merit), then Hogan would be more like, say, Queen: yes, their hits are played out, yes, some of their later stuff got a bit cheesy, yes, you "grow out of them" -- but their success was built on some solid foundations and they were ultimately doing something that has some artistic worth which was precisely the reason for their success in the first place.

 

At best Hogan is that, at worst maybe U2 ... actually, U2 is too harsh, maybe like what? Elton John? Abba maybe.

 

On second thoughts, this analogy isn't very helpful but you see the basic point.

[Ricky Jackson]

Hogan is Elvis

[JerryvonKramer]

Yes! Absolutely perfect Kelly! He even has the terrible films.

[Ricky Jackson]

And Parv is 100% right. Sure, I hated Hogan in the 90s too. Pretty intensely at one point. But he earned his push and every bit of stardom and success that he received. He was part of a lot of shit and he was part of tons of great stuff. Rate him or don't, who cares. But he was one of the greatest ever.

[BillThompson]

The idea of Hogan carrying Orton would blow a few minds.

 

It blew mine, because that's definitely not what I was expecting. It's not that Orton didn't try, but Hogan was on fire in that match and he took charge, carrying Orton's hand the entire way and producing a really good 6 minute match as a result.

[ohtani's jacket]

Phil Collins has more artistic merit than Chief Jay Strongbow.

[Loss]

I'm willing to give Hogan his due for a lot of things, but he is pretty much the sole reason someone will always chime into a discussion about ring work by making it more about drawing money or being a superstar. I realize that's not his fault personally, but I do feel like he dumbed down wrestling in many ways and made it too cartoonish and stupid.

 

He was wildly successful and he's headed some of the biggest runs any wrestling companies have ever had, but I would argue that neanderthals like Hogan keep just as many would-be fans away (because they see roided up wrestlers screaming at each other and think that's all that wrestling is) as it does draw them in. Give the same promotional machine, consistent booking, television production, favorable/meticulous match construction by a team of agents and merchandising savvy to pump up good in-ring work, Southern-style wrestling and stars who seem like actual real people. Would it work? Maybe, maybe not, but because of dudes like Hogan, we will probably never know. And while I like him way more than I did at one time, the wrestling fan in me who just likes what he likes and makes no attempts to step outside of that at all will always hold that against him.

 

His success is the reason wrestling companies try to build around guys like Roman Reigns with 100% faith instead of guys like Daniel Bryan with 100% faith. So yeah, he has some good qualities, but fuck him too.

[JerryvonKramer]

Phil Collins has more artistic merit than Chief Jay Strongbow.

No arguments from me there

[Loss]

I realize after posting that that Hogan is really more of the symbolic face of a wrestling philosophy I don't particularly care for than he is anything else. It's possible some of the cross to bear belongs to Vince McMahon more than it does Hulk Hogan, because Vince was the guy who had that vision. I can't and won't deny his success, but it's really difficult for me to separate Hogan from Vince. Without Hogan, Vince doesn't have his initial success. Without Vince, I think Hogan would have just been a wrestling star in the long run. Maybe a wildly popular one, but a wrestling star nonetheless, like Flair or Dusty or the Road Warriors. The promotional machine backing Hogan was so integral to his act that it's hard for me to separate the two.

[JerryvonKramer]

Loss, you'll notice I didn't mention money or drawing in my post. That's not coming into my criteria at all. Even if the qualities and abilities I'm talking about led to success and stardom.

 

Just think it's important to point out that I'm (and I guess Kelly too) are not saying "Hogan is the biggest draw ever therefore you must include him", that isn't the argument.

[Loss]

But if Hogan wasn't the biggest draw ever - let's say he was a star on the level of Lex Luger - would you still think all of those things were true?

[JerryvonKramer]

I don't see why not. Luger will likely rank above Hogan for me when is all said and done. But let's even pretend that he wouldn't ... I'm ultimately talking about crowd control and "aura". I can think of guys who were really really over, who time and again didn't know what to do with that overness -- Sting would spring to mind. Sid. Warrior. Make your own list. Hogan knew what to do.

 

Like I said, I think it's far too easy to take the things Hogan does well for granted and assume that they are easy. They aren't easy. Many subsequent attempts to manufacture "big match moments" like those Hogan gives us have fallen flat on their face. Very very few wrestlers have that certain quality Hogan does in making the event seem like the biggest thing ever. It's why I quoted you and Childs talking about Choshu.

 

You can point to marketing and booking, but he does it in AWA against Bockwinkel, he does it in Japan in 1981 and 1991, he does it at Wrestlemania 18 when he wasn't booked in the main event, and he did it in WCW after the heel turn.

 

Of course, there's a certain amount of chicken and egg because you can't completely take context away: he's only in the spots he is because he was a star. But as I mentioned you can point to other guys who have been put in similar spots and floundered.

 

He knew his audience, he knew how to work them, he knew his limitations and how to work around them, he understood ring psychology.

 

Many of these sorts of arguments will be made for a guy like Jerry Lawler. People will argue on this forum -- and with a straight face -- that Lawler pulling down the strap is better than Hogan hulking up. But think about it and the psychology is more or less identical, and I think Hogan's timing was almost as good as Lawler's. I also think that he took a good beating when needed. It would be interesting for one of the people who are really really high on Lawler to put forward a point-by-point argument demonstrating why they think Lawler was a better babyface than Hogan, beyond his ability to throw a working punch.

 

I do understand why you hold some of the things you do against Hogan, Charles, but to extend Kelly's analogy, that would be a bit like blaming Elvis for X Factor.

[goodhelmet]

It would be interesting for one of the people who are really really high on Lawler to put forward a point-by-point argument demonstrating why they think Lawler was a better babyface than Hogan, beyond his ability to throw a working punch.

 

 

I actually have bullet points on this that I couldn't post on the old board because of the formatting problems. Still including the quality of the punches.

[ohtani's jacket]

Lawler was an average joe who succeeded at pro-wrestling through grit and determination. Hogan was presented as a genetic freak and outstanding athlete. There was a world of difference in their appeal to the common man.

[Parties]

 

Choshu brought that almost unparalleled ability to make everything feel important. Wherever he was seemed to be the eye of the storm

his infectious energy and charisma turned everything to gold for a while.

Hogan's ability to electrify a promotion and make things feel more important should count for something. He did it not once, but THREE times in his career for three different companies.

 

 

Assuming the three cases in question were WWF, WCW, and TNA: Hogan in all three cases was likewise instrumental in creating the worst periods in the histories of all three companies. Moreso than any other wrestler. You can't celebrate Hogan's positive influence on box office (clear, valid) or his "big match" capacity without acknowledging that he was true poison (and IMO equally poisonous) at three pivotal points (end of WCW, '02-'03 WWE, and post-2010 TNA) as well. All three groups were badly burned by him, in ways so damaging that each company has since failed to recover. Anyone reading the news lately knows that Hogan is his own worst enemy.

 

And while this sound unfair to some, I blame him (with Vince of course) for a lot of the current WWE overemphasis on legends getting that “one last run” a dozen times over, at the expense of the last 12-15 years worth of young talent. So much of Vince's conservative booking and obsession with the past via old grudges originates in Hogan's big runs after the Rock match at WM18. But to be fair, perhaps that's simply Vince chasing Hogan's aura and failing to catch it.

 

As a worker, he absolutely does not make it. For all the matches he made “bigger”, what about the endless matches he made smaller due to his ego and rapidly deteriorating abilities post-1990 or so? Is seven good years ('83-90) a top 100 length of time, even when compared solely to direct peers like Bret, Valentine, Andre, Slaughter, Savage? He has some very good matches and very good performances. But people sought out and glorified those performances (vs. Hansen, Fujinami, Schultz, Savage, Backlund, etc.). Are there ten desert island Hogan matches? Is there even one, on the spectrum of everything else? I recently said that Earthquake at Summerslam '90 is the best case I've recently seen in which you could argue Hogan looked great and (with the help of four other awesome guys) carried a bad worker to a solid match. But I don't think Hogan has many maestro carryjob outings on his resume.