10 Times WWE Babyfaces Were Heels Backstage
8. Hulk Hogan
WrestleMania IX closed out on a shot of Hulk Hogan soaking up the cheers of an elated Las Vegas car park crowd, but Vince McMahon's blindness to that exact pop reflected how deaf he was becoming to what really mattered.
Bret Hart was ultimately never vindicated as a domestic draw thanks to poor financial years with him on top of the promotion, but his late-1992 was a rare case of The Chairman attempting to instigate a philosophical shift rather than play catch-up with an already-altered paradigm.
Hart and his first and second contenders Shawn Michaels and Razor Ramon were destined to do poorer numbers than the Hogans and Warriors they were gamely taking over from, but they represented a reeducation period about contemporary WWE Superstars replacing the tired 1980s aesthetic.
It never truly worked because McMahon never stuck at it long enough to see if dedication equalled dollars. 'The Hitman' captivated international audiences when WWE needed them most and Shawn Michaels was a 1996 success story until the New World Order storyline sent WCW into the stratosphere, but Hogan cleverly played to Vince's base instincts on that uneasy afternoon in 1993.
He was a big a d*ckhead as Champion, too. His well-documented New Japan Pro Wrestling burial of the belt was