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Obviously, the major news of the day (and really, the week) was the Hulk Hogan situation. There's been a LOT of feedback to the story, both from fans upset about the situation to fans upset about WWE distancing themselves. Regarding WWE, the reality is that in today's society, there is no way a publicly traded company is not going to fire a well known public persona for something that embarrassing, especially when they are in the business of producing a PG-rated product. It would have invited a lot of bad publicity upon themselves for something they had nothing to do with and for something that happened when Hogan wasn't even employed by WWE.
I've seen a lot of people upset that WWE distanced themselves from Hogan. If you think WWE wanted to be anywhere near the fallout of this situation, you don't know your history. Let's not forget that in the early 1990s, Hogan making a false statement on the Arsenio Hall Show about his own personal steroid use in the wake of the trial of Dr. George Zahorian (who was found guilty of selling steroids to pro wrestlers) led to a ton of media scrutiny not just on Hogan but on the then-WWF and all of that led to the Vince McMahon indictment. Sure, McMahon was found not guilty but the personal and professional toll all of that took on McMahon personally and the company professionally set the stage for WCW to overtake them during the Monday Night Wars before the advent of the Attitude Era turned it all back around. There's no way WWE wanted to even take a chance that history could repeat itself.
Make no doubt about it, had the exact same comments come out of John Cena's mouth, WWE would have made the exact same moves they made on Friday.
For Hogan, yesterday had to be one of the worst days of his life. On Tuesday, he was working the Tough Enough taping as one of the (if not THE great living legends of pro wrestling. Yesterday, he watched Hulkamania potentially die at his own hands. Hulk Hogan the wrestler certainly did. Make no doubt about it - At 61 years old, the idea of that last Hogan match at Wrestlemania died forever. It's possible we will see Hogan back on a WWE stage again, but by the time it happens, chances are he won't be able to perform that one last match that so many fans wanted to see. That falls on Hogan's shoulders. He was in a position to be the all-time legend of pro wrestling forever until the day he died and he caused that to end yesterday. Hogan may wrestle again, especially if Eric Bischoff ever gets a new project going or if someone wants to throw a lot of money his way, but the idea of Hogan having that one more Wrestlemania moment...the train may have left the station forever because there's no time for it to return.
It also had to be extremely frustrating for Hogan to watch decades of goodwill collapse and see himself caught in the vortex of the story, which was picked up EVERYWHERE, based on things that happened almost a decade ago. Eight years ago, Hogan was in the midst of heavy personal issues. His reality series was on it's last legs, his son was indicted after a car wreck severely injured his friend and Hogan was cheating on his wife as his marriage was heading towards his then-wife Linda filing for divorce. Hogan's claimed during that time period he understood why someone would want to commit murder and even considered suicide.
This isn't to defend Hogan, because of the things he said are not defendable, but when you look at the time period, it's a period where he was personally going through some serious issues (some of his own creation, to be sure) and when people are down and frustrated and lost in that moment, they do say things that are nasty, terrible and way out of character. Some do it because they drink. Some do it out of anger. I have no idea why Hogan said what he said, but based on the timeline, we have to remember that this wasn't something he said backstage at Tough Enough this past week but years ago during the darkest period of his adult life, before he was free and clear of his ex-wife, before he signed with TNA, before he was back in the WWE fold and well before he was re-married. His life was a personal wreck during this time period. It doesn't excuse him for hateful conduct, but it does frame where his mind was at during that time period. For all of that to come back and haunt him again, years after he's moved on from that era, had to be as decimating privately as it was personally.
Everything that one does in life comes back to them, positive and negative. For Hogan, the negative rebounded and struck him hard this week. It's possible he'll return to prominence in some corner of celebrity. Mike Tyson certainly had and he was convicted, not accused, of rape. The general public wants to love their heroes. The problem is that Hogan's celebrity has always been based in being the squeaky clean superhero and superheroes don't say and do what Hogan did in that conversation. Villains do, especially when the basis of the comments are in relation to their own daughter.
Like Bill Cosby, Hogan was held up on a pedestal by his fan base, a symbol of something they loved and in some ways, aspired to be, but once you see the ugly layer underneath the celebrity that's been presented to you for decades, it's impossible to unring that bell. Everything that person stood for and everything they did that inspired those fans dissipates, leaving disbelief and sadness in it's place.
All the reports and stories (and in Hogan's case, just like Cosby's, the story is in his own words) force the public's love and nostalgia for Hogan to now be seen in a different light. People will be looking back at past statements and decisions and will be looking for what could or could not be there. The trust level is shattered.
All of Hulk Hogan's charity work and everything he accomplished as a performer has a new permanent blemish beside it and there's no way to know how he's going to scrub it clean anytime soon, if ever.
All THAT said, The general public is usually very forgiving of celebrities who screw up (ask anyone from Hugh Grant to Rob Lowe), but it's going to take time and at 61, that's time that Hogan won't be able to make up....not to mention the emotional toll this is all going to be taking on his daughter Brooke, who gets now her name dragged across the media for something her father did eight years ago, as well as other members of his immediate family.
We haven't seen the last of Hulk Hogan the celebrity, but the Hulk Hogan that everyone grew up loving is gone forever. Today had to be the last straw for that public perception of Hulk Hogan.
In the past, Hogan has come back from steroid accusations, from the embarrassment of his son's Nick's legal issues, from a bitter divorce with his ex-wife Linda and from near-crippling back issues and he still might come back from this, but he'll never be able to get every single fan to go back to seeing him through the nostalgia-tinted glasses and pretend it's 1985 again when he walks out into the spotlight. There will always be a reminder, in some form, that paints him in a bad light for how he acted on that leaked tape.
Some will forgive, for sure, and they will always love him because he's Hulk Hogan...but a lot others will have long memories. Hogan is never going to be able to get the stench of this one completely off of him, no matter how hard he tries.
Mel Gibson was a far bigger star and his racist rant during a DUI arrest left his career in shambles.
Where Hogan's rant leaves him is something that only time can provide the answers to, but there's going to be a lot of doom and gloom first, especially if the teases that something worse is floating about and is yet to be revealed. Which leaves the question hanging: WHAT could be worse than what came out on Friday?
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