I had just put an interview to bed and started to wind down, when all of a sudden my phone started blowing up with messages and texts. My sister first asked if Hulk Hogan had passed away, followed by friends, colleagues, and anyone else who knew that I covered for the Sport of Kings.
After a quick check, it was confirmed that the man formerly known as Terry Bollea had died.
To say that the outpouring of support and love for the Hulkster across the spectrum, not just for those who wrestled with him in the squared circle, says a lot about the aura that was Hulk Hogan.
Which is fine. I won’t tell anyone how to process their grief. But to say Hogan in recent years has been a polarizing figure is putting it mildly. As for me, trying to square up my idolization of Hogan as a Real American that embodied everything I loved, from comic books to superhero cartoons, has been tough.
It feels like yesterday when I was in Catholic school and my friend Pat and I were talking about when Hogan faced Andre the Giant in the main event at Wrestlemania III. We then proceeded to replay those events, with Pat being a head taller than me as Andre, and me as Hogan (even though I was not blonde nor had the trademark Fu Manchu mustache). Our “Wrestlemania moment” was then subsequently broken up by our teacher, Sister Grace (who was near blind and almost deaf as a post), and she promptly hauled us both to the principal’s office for “fighting.”
In short, I was learning to kayfabe long before I ever heard the word.
But it was because of Hogan that I was willing to follow as a burgeoning Hulkamaniac, as well as be entranced by everything in the squared circle. I idolized everything he stood for: the training, the prayers, and eating the vitamins.
Ah, such fond memories from a more innocent time.
And then I got older and wiser.
This is one of the dangers I’ve come to realize as I cover the Sport of Professional Wrestling, as these gods, monsters, heroes, and villains of the squared circle are, at the end of the day, mere mortals with feet of clay.
Although in recent years Hogan and others referred to himself as “The Immortal One,” he was all too human. While we cheered him on in the WWF as the top babyface, we learned what role he played in the steroids scandal of the 1990s. He redeemed himself for a minute, hopping over to WCW after Vinnie Mac deemed him “too old” at the ripe age of 40. Then there was that moment he broke kids’ hearts when he finally turned heel and formed the New World Order with Kevin Nash and the late Scott Hall.
(A quick aside: my favorite memory was of Hogan and Chicago Bulls star Dennis Rodman squaring off against “Diamond” Dallas Page and the Utah Jazz’s Karl “The Mailman” Malone. You can see that match here:)
Again, good times.
Once the new millennium hit, things took a turn for the Hulkster. Depending on your tastes, his venture into reality TV did make him and his family popular, but it also strained his family dynamic. Then there was that awkward tape that came out where Hogan was caught in bed with the wife of his then friend, Bubba the Love Sponge, and hearing him utter some racist comments as it related to his daughter Brooke’s social life.
Before I continue, another quick aside:
Folks, if you or your loved one is friends with radio scum (which is like an old-timey podcast bro), please do the right thing and slap the stupid out of them before they are truly lost.
This has been a Lucid Luchador™ PSA.
I had to lighten up on that last part, seeing as how Hogan’s taste in his friends in recent years has put any sort of damper on his legacy. From being at the Republican National Convention to support Donald Trump to getting a Bronx-style cheer in Los Angeles at the WWE debut of Raw on Netflix, fans’ reactions were sharply divided.
Like I said, it’s hard to see your heroes fall from grace.
But some will look past that and only recognize the good he did for professional wrestling over the years, separating Hogan from Bollea. I get that is how some people will process it, and I will not take that away from them. But to me, it felt like Bollea was “living the gimmick,” and I cannot make the same distinction others have.
Much like the late Malcolm-Jamal Warner, star of The Cosby Show, was asked about how he felt about Bill Cosby after learning of his crimes against women, he explained he cannot defend his actions, but he wouldn’t throw him under the bus either.
And that is where I land. Now, I’m sure whoever is reading this, you’re probably ready to burn me at the stake or call ICE on me because I’m not falling in line with everyone singing his praises. The simple fact is that all I am doing is telling the truth, as others are telling their truth. If you look at the postings on social media in less than 24 hours since the news broke out, many have had various takes on how they will remember the Hulkster.
As the French philosopher Voltaire once stated:
“To the living we owe respect, but to the dead we owe only the truth.”
Indeed, Bubba, and the truth is hard to come by these days for both the living and the dead, as well as having basic respect for our fellow humans.
So how should we remember Hulk Hogan, and how should we define his legacy? I thought about the line from The Dark Knight, where Harvey Dent uses Julius Caesar in relation to Batman by explaining, “You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become a villain.” But that felt too simplistic, and too black and white (or red and yellow, depending on your color scheme these days).
I decided to go straight to the Bard himself from that famous scene in Julius Caesar, as Marc Antony addresses the Roman people at the funeral of Caesar, and this seems a fit way to eulogize Hogan and all he stood for.
“Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears!
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them,
The good is oft interred with their bones;
So let it be with Caesar. The noble Brutus
Hath told you Caesar was ambitious;
If it were so, it was a grievous fault,
And grievously hath Caesar answer’d it.”
I’m sure others will have more to say on the subject, especially those closer to him. As for what judgment comes to Hogan, I leave that to The Great Promoter and let them decide if he should get a push in the Main Event in the clouds, be jobbed out down below, or simply wish him the best in his future endeavors.
Whatever the case, for everything Hulk Hogan has done in and out of the ring, it will be a legacy that will define Hulkamania Forever for years to come.
