Over the years, a prevailing narrative that has always been discussed when talking about the career of Hulk Hogan is his stubbornness and occasional outright refusal to put over other talents inside the squared circle.
On a recent episode of After 83 Weeks, Eric Bischoff discusses this long-standing belief and says it is not true. Specifically, Eric Bischoff was asked about Hulk Hogan not wanting to go to Korea for the 1995 Collision in Korea event because he did not want to lose to Antonio Inoki, who would go on to face Ric Flair at the special event.
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Eric Bischoff says there was no possibility of this being a reason why Hogan didn’t want to go to Korea and would also say that Hulk Hogan was simply not a fan of traveling following his exit from WWE in 1993.
“No, there wasn’t a possibility. And I know a lot of fans and people that are students of the history of wrestling in general and Hogan in particular, want to believe that type of narrative because it’s been out there and it’s so prevalent. But, you know, Hogan had no problem job and for Billy Kidman on national television. So I don’t think that doing a job for Antonio Inoki in Pyongyang, North Korea, was really the issue,” Bischoff began.
“The issue really was [the] travel. And to this day. I mean, Hulk doesn’t like to travel. He’s never really liked traveling. He pretty much wrote that off back in 1994 when he left the WWE, because, for a variety of other reasons, but one of those was he just didn’t like being away from his kids and his home. So it really was despite the narrative and I know it’s so popular and ingrained in so many minds that it’ll never go away. But, you know, ‘jobbing to Inoki,’ and I have a hard time even saying it because it sounds so juvenile. But I understand the question. I’m not criticizing you for asking it, because it’s one that I think a lot of people probably believe, but it’s just not true.”
The rivalry Hulk Hogan had with Billy Kidman took place in the year 2000 and would see the Cruiserweight star face the WWE Hall of Famer, in a losing effort, at WCW Slamboree.
(Transcription credit for the above quotes should go to Robert DeFelice of WrestleZone)
