20 More Surprising WWE Facts You Probably Didn't Know
8. Hulk Hogan Owes His Pythons To The Superstar
While the phrase ‘gimmick infringement’ was coined decades ago to describe the circumstance in which one wrestler takes an aspect of another wrestler’s character or performance that’s gotten over and uses it to get himself over too… it’s mostly an ironic complaint.
The fact of the matter is, wrestlers regularly nick stuff from each other. If you’re being charitable, you can call it homage, or you can call it what it is - outright theft, usually with a wink. Ric Flair yoinked the original ‘Nature Boy’ Buddy Rogers’ whole gimmick - his hair, his strut, the figure four - and cranked it up to eleven to make it his own.
Next to that, Hulk Hogan’s ripping off of ‘Superstar’ Billy Graham seems almost gentlemanly - but rip him off he did (the hair, the ear-cupping - even the villainous black beard when he was Hollywood Hulk Hogan). The most obvious lift, however, was his whole 24-inch pythons schtick: the Superstar had 22-inch pythons, but Hogan couldn’t resist one-upping him.