7 Wrestlers Who Made Vince McMahon Their BITCH!
4. Hulk Hogan
Vince McMahon and Hulk Hogan enjoyed an incredibly successful collaborative relationship throughout the 1980s. They were perfectly in sync. Vince could not expand without Hogan; Hogan could not make anywhere near the money he did under a different promoter. The relationship was even and mutually beneficial. These were the good times.
Hogan misjudged his crossover appeal in the early 1990s. Vince was understanding initially, even awarding Hulk a warm televised send-off, until Hogan signed for WCW in 1994. Vince, spurned, lashed out. He depicted Hogan as a money-obsessed geezer too old to keep up with his New Generation of talent in 1996 (before rehiring him, six years older, in 2002). When Hogan did eventually return to the fold, he played nice for a while. He jobbed for fun, losing matches to the Rock, Kurt Angle, and Brock Lesnar - but Hogan was clever. He knew that Vince was struggling to create new stars as the 2000s dragged on, and positioned himself to get his precious wins knowing that he could get away with his shameless politicking.
The Hogan Vs. Shawn Michaels feud was originally envisioned as a series. Since Hogan wasn’t interested in losing, he went over the guy who was sticking around after SummerSlam 2005 before this became normalised. Hogan set that trend in motion. He also went over Randy Orton at the same show in 2006.
He returned at great expense to do what he wanted, and while his timing was smart, he did deprive himself of the ultimate payday: Steve Austin was watching, with much suspicion, and refused to engage seriously in Hogan’s constant petitions for a WrestleMania dream match.