Hulk Hogan in TNA

So Hulk Hogan announced roughly two weeks ago that he and Eric Bischoff had signed on with TNA, and the IWC has been buzzing and speculating ever since. Remarkably most of this talk has been positive.  TNA marks and wrestlers all seem very excited about this, and have referred to it as the way TNA is going to step up to the next level.  I’ve only heard a handful of people predict Hogan’s signing as the downfall of the company, but I think that is a lot more likely than them having some kind of meteoric rise due to signing on this old has-been. Let’s look at some of the reasons why the Hulkster won’t be saving the company, shall we.

The problem is people are acting like this is the man who has been signed, but it isn’t.  This is the man almost 30 years ago!  Hell, he looked old even then.   He’s an old man now who can barely move with his fake hip.   Before this signing most people were talking about how pathetic he was for having to put on this tour of Australia with the other old man, Ric Flair.  The man has made a lot of mistakes and is forced to wrestle again because he needs the money.  So from a performance perspective we can expect a man who is 10 years worse than he was when he sucked in WCW.   But Hogan has never really been about wrestling, he’s always been more of a character relying heavily on an image.  Since the 90s he’s been relying on the nostalgia of his image in the 80s, but he’s done a lot to tarnish that image now.

In the 90s Hogan revealed his true character to the world by exposing himself as the ultimate backstage politician. He became known for promoting himself and his friends at the expense of others. Young talent was held back and publicly ridiculed on TV, while Hogan and his buddies hogged the spotlight. Ultimately Hogan played a huge part in the company going out of business by destroying their on screen product with his selfish use of creative control, the same creative control he is alleged to have in TNA. More recently Hogan showed the same selfish attitude when he partook in a feud with Shawn Michaels that had to be ended early when Hogan refused to lose any of their matches.

I attended a Smackdown taping in 2003, the final show before Wrestlemania 19 and Hogan’s match with Vince McMahon. It is the only time I’ve seen Hogan live, and I’ll admit that I was very excited. He came out and started posing, playing to the crowd and all our childhood memories. Then the asshole stood there for 10 minutes “taking in the adulation.”  They had to go to a commercial break and come back before he spoke. Honestly, people were going nuts when he came out, but it died down a lot by the time he began his promo. They piped in a louder, longer reaction when it aired. When Hogan did speak it was mostly the same tired act he had been using whenever he was a face since the 80s. There were a lot of “brothers” and talk about “Hulkamania”, but nothing much was really said. By the end of the promo I was bored, and I don’t think I was the only one. It had become obvious that this man was a shell of his former self. And Hogan has gotten a lot worse since then!

In recent years Hogan has become more known for whoring out himself and his family than for wrestling. He has over exposed himself and really disgraced his name by promoting his terrible daughter’s failed music career and starring in one of the fakest, most over produced “reality shows” I’ve ever seen. Many people are sick of Hogan and his pathetic attempts to garner attention at this point. His entire life appears to be one bad publicity stunt. His new image that he’s created is of a truly trashy individual and a creepy con-man.

Hogan lately has been discussed mostly for his very public divorce, unsettling flirtatious behavior with his daughter, his idiot son street racing and nearly killing a man in the process, his ex-wife dating her son’s very young friend, and Hulk himself dating a young girl who looked a lot like his daughter. Hogan and his family have become pure tabloid trash. The latest, Hogan has a new book. He joined TNA to help finance his divorce and to promote another biography. This is a pathetic, thinly veiled attempt to shill us more crap by Hogan and TNA. Hogan’s book tour has mostly been about him telling a story about attempting suicide since the divorce, oh and he’s barely mentioned TNA. He doesn’t honestly care about the company and his heart won’t be in it to help it grow. Lets look at a couple of reasons why TNA won’t be able to capitalize on their recent mainstream attention.

As you see, they failed to do so when they already tried bringing in Hogan in 2003. BTW, this was Hogan’s only appearance with the company! Nothing came of it, and no one cared. The never-was midcarder Jarrett did his lame guitar smashing gimmick and that was that. Yet the pathetic company that TNA is, they constantly include this as a top company moment and air this footage even today!

In general TNA sucks, and they always have. Their booking is awful and usually makes no sense. It has been proven too many times to count, and the way they’ve mishandled other talent like Somao Joe, Kurt Angle and Booker T should show you what we are in store for. And if it is true that Hogan and Bischoff will have creative and booking power, than expect things to go much the same route as the early mentioned WCW, when Hogan and friends killed the product by holding others back and only promoting themselves.

Perhaps most importantly, people are already losing interest. It hasn’t even been two weeks and the buzz has died considerably. The airing of Hogsn’s press conference announcement on Impact was the lowest rated part of the show! The overall ratings were up slightly, but dropped back down to their normal low levels this week. Here’s a thought, maybe they should have gotten Hogan in the ring and started a storyline after the announcement, instead of airing a damn press conference and showing talent talking about what Hogan joining TNA means! If he couldn’t start yet then they should have delayed the whole announcement. All their momentum is virtually gone.

So, in closing, to all you TNA fanboys who were taughting Hogan’s arrival as if it were the second coming, think again. If anything this should go to show you that TNA will likely never grow, and will always be the very distant number 2 wrestling company, until they finally fold.