411’s WWE Rivals Report: Hulk Hogan vs. Rowdy Roddy Piper

-Back to my childhood again though my memories of wrestling child start just after Hogan/Piper as I can remember back to Hogan/Mr. Wonderful, Hogan/Bundy and then obviously all of Hogan/Andre. This should be fun! Let’s get to it!

-Freddie Prinze Jr. is our host and this week he is joined at the table by JBL, Devon Dudley, Natalya, and Booker T.

-Booker T says both Hogan and Piper were Icons and larger than life. They note it was the birth of WrestleMania and MTV. HHH gives us a lesson about the territory days and how he respected boundaries. Hogan talks about working in AWA and getting his character defined.

-1983 sees the rise of cable and Vince McMahon sees national expansion as the future of the industry. He got a national outlet and knew he needed an larger than life American Hero. Enter Hulk Hogan and the rest is history. Hogan says Vince came to his house and laid out his vision and Hogan was in instantly. Hogan returns as the hero to WWF on Jan 5, 1984, and there was no waiting for him to face adversity, he was crowned Champion and top star in the company as soon as they hit MSG. Edge says Hulk Hogan as a comic book come to life and his little kid brain couldn’t grasp it. “It was everything awesome.” Pretty much the same thoughts I had.

-We meet Roddy Piper: “Have a nice fucking day. Go fuck yourself. Give me the microphone and get out of my way.” Piper made his name in Portland and then Mid-Atlantic. Vince swallowed him up in 1984 and made him the biggest bad guy in his company. Hogan notes Piper was the opposite of him and Edge says when he watched Piper you never knew where it was going, but you knew there was always a threat of something bad happening. Again, accurate. Hogan says they had legit heat and that Piper wanted the Hogan spot. He says Piper legitimately didn’t like him.

-MTV comes calling as they partner with WWF in 1984. Cyndi Lauper shows up to MSG and presents Hulk Hogan, and others in the WWF a golden record. Piper breaks the record over Albano’s head, kicks Lauper, and slams David Wolfe as a riot nearly breaks out at MSG.

-That all leads to The Rock N Wrestling Connection as Hogan and all the MTV rock stars are threatening Piper because he is anti-rock and MTV. Hogan even got to walk on stage with Lauper when she won a Grammy for Best New Artist in 1985. MTV was so invested they Had The Brawl to Settle it All and The War To Settle The Score which were big ratings hits. The latter featured Hogan vs. Piper for the WWF Title.

-Commercials!

-Back to The War to Settle The Score as Hogan and Piper have an intense 6 minute match. Piper says things elevated as far as animosity between the two of them as they forgot it takes two to tango. Hogan mentions he beat the piss out of Piper and he gave it back to him. The match ends with no winner and Mr. Wonderful helps Piper, but Mr. T comes in from the crowd to make the save and that sets up WrestleMania.

-Hogan notes the finish was the way it was because Piper wasn’t ready to put him over clean. Piper says that Hogan should have been the face of the business, but everyone was still butting heads. Hogan talks about MTV being there and bringing in new viewers for the WWF and a new demographic.

-We learn about how amazing Mr. T is and we see celebrities in the MSG lockers with T and Hogan including Danny DeVito and Andy Warhol. Just crazy times! As mentioned this all lead to WrestleMania I and Hogan/T vs. Piper/Wonderful. Piper talks about being brought up old school and if someone from outside the business comes in, he was taught to eat them for lunch. Hogan had to be the peacekeeper.

-WrestleMania: Hogan talks about Vince putting everything he had on the one night and he knew they had to deliver and tear the roof off the garden. I need to go watch that show again.

-Commercials!

-WrestleMania: Hogan talks about The Garden, but nothing had him ready for that night. He had goosebumps on goosebumps. Edge says that it all still came down to Hogan and Piper no matter who else was out there. Hogan continues to talk about trying to keep peace as he was worried Piper and Mr Wonderful would take advantage of Mr. T. T says that Piper wasn’t a bunch of muscles, but he was tough.

-They talk about the massive crowd and people watching on closed circuit and how Hogan needed that villain. Piper notes they all paid to see him get his butt kicked. I mean sure, but we saw people other than Piper draw just as much money and sometimes more working against Hogan. Mr. T and Hogan get the win though it still ended up being because Wonderful took a cast shot before getting pinned. They all note that even on a huge show like WrestleMania it still took something like an illegal object for Piper’s team to be on the losing side. Piper: “I’m not a bad guy. Don’t be judging me here. It’s a tough business. How do you stay on top?” Hogan thinks because there was never a real winner between the two the fans got tired of seeing all the DQ and Count-out finishes and there was nowhere else to go.

-Commercials!

-WrestleMania did what it needed and the WWF was off and running. We jump ahead and Vince is moving in a younger direction and Hogan wasn’t finished yet, so he heads off to WCW. He says WCW was #2 and not in the same universe as WWF, but had some great guys there. Eric Bischoff notes they needed that flagship character to show they were serious competing with WWF.

-Bash at The Beach 1994: Hulk Hogan makes his WCW in ring debut and beats Ric Flair for the WCW Title. That ran for two yeas and the fans were starting to get tired of the red and yellow. Hogan saw Hall and Nash come in and the idea was to change the character and go heel.

-Bash at The Beach 1996: I will never get sick of watching this moment! HULK HOGAN TURNS HEEL ON RANDY SAVAGE AND THE NWO IS BORN! Lex Luger: “who would have thought the red and yellow would go black?”

-Back in the WWF, Piper was treated as a legend and made on screen president, but soon he was out and there was only one place to go.

-Halloween Havoc 1996: Hulk Hogan celebrates after a win over Randy Savage, and as he celebrates, some familiar bagpipe music hits and Piper makes his WCW debut. Piper gives him credit for his sell job of seeing him walk down the aisle. Bischoff asked Hogan about Piper and Hogan told him they still had another dance together and Piper notes they had unfinished business. WWF crushed WCW for using their “old stars” but it did crazy numbers and PPV buys so WCW had the last laugh there.

-Hogan talks about how this was a bit fresher because the roles were reversed. Hogan was hiding behind the nWo while Piper was fighting on his own with a damaged hip. We see World War 3 where they sign the contract and the nWo abuse Piper, who hobbles to his feet and cuts a fired up babyface promo.

-Starrcade 1996: As mentioned, this did a monster PPV number for WCW at the time and blew away every WWF show for that year including WrestleMania XII. I believe Starrcade did 340,000 and Mania was around 290,000.

-Commercials!

-Starrcade 1996: JBL notes it was two, old, great legends you just had to see. Not sure if that is what they were really saying in WWF locker rooms back in 1996. Piper hooks a sleeper and gets the clean win though we learned after the match it wasn’t for the WCW Title because Piper was affiliated with WCW. Hogan says they made progress in WCW with the storyline.

-SuperBrawl VII: Bischoff notes that whatever issues they had disappeared when they stepped in the ring. Piper gets a proper Title Match because of his win at Starrcade. Piper talks about the art of fighting and how it is like chess. Hogan talks about being the coward and the bad guy. Hogan gets the win by cheating thanks to help from Randy Savage. They note that Hogan waited twelve years for this win and it still wasn’t clean. The table laughs that even then Piper still had to protect his character but at least here it made more sense since Hogan was the bad guy. Bischoff notes he had respect for Piper and that Piper knew the run in WCW was likely his last ride and he matured. Jimmy Hart notes that both realized at that point that neither guy was there to take the other one’s spot.

-This wasn’t the end of the rivalry though and Freddy says that if Piper was still alive we still may see them out there against each other. We did get one last call back though when Hogan returned to the WWE.

-WrestleMania XIX: Hogan vs. McMahon with a guest appearance from Roddy Piper!

-Commercials! Next week it’s Hart vs. Austin. ABOUT TIME! Oh, and Hart vs. Michaels as well as we are getting two episodes. Okay then!

-Back to Hogan/McMahon as they have a tremendously entertaining match that was better than it had any right of being because both guys know how to tell a story and suck a crowd into what they are doing. Piper shows up and clocks Hogan with a pipe just to keep the feud going.

-JBL notes that two old guys will always try to get one over on the other.

-Hall of Fame 2005: Piper and Hogan got inducted on the same nice which was cool, but Piper probably deserved to headline his own class. What was great though was how well they spoke of each other and then the hug they shared. MY CHILDHOOD!

-We see more interactions between the two at WrestleMania XXX and on special episodes of RAW. Piper and T shake hands and bury the hatchet at WrestleMania XXX in a fun backstage segment.

-Sadly, the world lost Roddy Piper in 2015. Hogan plays a voice message he got from Piper two days after he passed away. “I’m walking with Jesus today, my brother. Walking with Jesus, loving you and praying for you.” Hogan isn’t sure what happened as he knows delays can happen with messages, but two days seemed weird. He still has the message at home.

-The talking heads wrap up by noting Piper and Hogan were two sides to the same coin. Edge is thankful they came together at the same time and he was there to watch at the right age. Piper says he never would have picked anyone else no matter any issues as Hogan was the guy. They knew they had each other, so ring the bell and let’s roll.

-Naturally, I loved this show because I grew up on this. Anything with Hogan is always going to be an easy win with me because it’s what made me love professional wrestling. The early Hogan/Piper rivalry has been covered countless times because it built WrestleMania I. I appreciated they gave some props to the WCW version and then touched on the moments between the two after their in ring careers had ended. I can see where there were some issues as most people had no problem taking the big leg and making tons of cash around the horn with Hogan, but Piper wasn’t going to just sacrifice what he felt he built by losing night after night. It is funny that it took Hogan taking a clean loss before Piper finally gave Hogan any kind of pin win. Hogan has stated he was all for him and Piper trading the WWF Title, but it seemed each wanted the other to put him over first and neither would blink. It also seems Vince couldn’t get them to agree, and you know he wasn’t going to job Hogan out first. Such an interesting time as things were a bit different back then. Again, this was a lot of fun for me. Thanks for reading!