10 Wrestling Grudges That Changed The Business
3. Hulk Hogan Vs Jesse Ventura
As far as heel voices in the booth went, there was perhaps no rival of Hulk Hogan's more convincing than Jesse Ventura. And it could have well been thanks to getting in the way of any attempt at fiction.
As far back as 1986, 'The Body' had attempted to bring wrestlers together around the idea of unionisation, but his plans were thwarted by none other than 'The Hulkster' himself.
Speaking on Stone Cold Steve Austin's podcast's in detail about the situation, Ventura said;
"It was WrestleMania 2. Two weeks before it, all the publicity had gone out. The advantage was ours...I stood up in the dressing room and I gave a speech to the boys and...I said, ‘if we go together and simply tell the media we are not wrestling unless union negotiators by federal law come in and give us the opportunity to unionise.’ The next night, I got a phone call from Vince who basically threatened to fire me if I ever brought it up again and read me the riot act...When I sued Vince, we had to depose him. My attorney...said, ‘Mr. McMahon,’ he said, ‘has there ever been a union in wrestling?’ Vince [replies], ‘no.’ [The lawyer asks] ‘Anyone ever try to form one?’ Vince sat a minute, he says, ‘well, yeah, as a matter of fact, Jesse Ventura spouted his mouth off about it once years ago.’ And my attorney goes, ‘well, how do you know that? Did you hear him? No? Well, how did you know he spouted his mouth off?’ He didn’t even hesitate. ‘Hulk Hogan told me’."
Ventura was initially in disbelief, until the trial revealed the motivation behind Hogan's betrayal of trust. He explained;
"Well, in the trial, we got the [financial] records of WrestleMania 3, the big one, him and Andre [The Giant], well, Hogan made more money than all of us combined, including Andre...So, naturally, he didn’t want a union...the picture was crystal clear to me, that he sold us out because he was getting taken care of and he didn’t want nobody else horning in on the good deal he had.”
Ventura worked with the company until 1990, being forced to stay on terms with both Hogan and McMahon. But with the best opportunity lost, the conversation - outside of a passing fancy in 2020 - never really came up again.