At Their Peak, Who Was Hottest/Most Popular?

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  • SoxFan01605
    All Star
    • Jan 2008
    • 7982

    #16
    Re: At Their Peak, Who Was Hottest/Most Popular?

    Originally posted by Control-X
    Hulk Hogan popularized pro wresting in his time but Steve Austin catapulted it to greater heights, then the Attitude Era happened, where he was the most popular WWF/E merchandise at that point. Stone Cold got my vote and it hurts 'cause I'm a huge Hulkamania fan.
    That argument could would work pretty well within just a wrestling fanbase, but in the 80s, even people who didn't know a thing about wrestling knew Hulk Hogan. Hell, you could argue that the groundwork for that fanbase to even be there was due to Hogan.

    SCSA was the most popular guy at the peak of wrestling popularity within the mainstream. Hogan WAS wrestling to the mainstream. That's the difference.

    Add in that he crossed-over so big without 24/7 entertainment coverage and internet presence and it's an even wider gap IMO.

    On a separate note, I'd give an honorary mention to Jerry Lawler for some of the same reasons (on a smaller, more specific scale). While certainly never the "hottest" (although, it's easy to forget that wrestling was once mostly territorial and Jerry is big in Memphis) his work with Kaufman was big for mainstream recognition as well.

    Comment

    • 55
      Banned
      • Mar 2006
      • 20857

      #17
      Re: At Their Peak, Who Was Hottest/Most Popular?

      Originally posted by areobee401
      The age of some posters is showing in the poll results.

      The answer is Hogan.
      This. Period.

      And somebody voted for HHH? Seriously?

      Comment

      • Segagendude
        Banned
        • Aug 2008
        • 7940

        #18
        Re: At Their Peak, Who Was Hottest/Most Popular?

        I could be wrong, but I believe Hogan was the first pro wrestler to act in a major movie (Rocky III).
        Long before the Rock obviously.

        This brought fans into the wrestling world. So Hogan wins IMO.

        Comment

        • Redacted01
          Hall Of Fame
          • Aug 2007
          • 10316

          #19
          Re: At Their Peak, Who Was Hottest/Most Popular?

          Hogan. Hands down. No questions asked. He is in a league of his own. Without him, there is no Stone Cold and Attitude era.

          Comment

          • PVarck31
            Moderator
            • Jan 2003
            • 16869

            #20
            Re: At Their Peak, Who Was Hottest/Most Popular?

            Hogan for sure. nothing else to say about it.

            Comment

            • jpup
              MVP
              • Feb 2003
              • 4571

              #21
              Re: At Their Peak, Who Was Hottest/Most Popular?

              1. Austin
              2. Hogan
              3. Rock

              That's the list. Austin was the biggest draw at his peak than any wrestler in history. Over their careers, Hogan is the most popular and continues to be.
              NFL: Tennessee Titans
              MLB: Cincinnati Reds

              Comment

              • Seymour Scagnetti
                Banned
                • Oct 2006
                • 2489

                #22
                Re: At Their Peak, Who Was Hottest/Most Popular?

                Originally posted by jpup
                1. Austin
                2. Hogan
                3. Rock

                That's the list. Austin was the biggest draw at his peak than any wrestler in history. Over their careers, Hogan is the most popular and continues to be.
                Not even close, at their peaks Hogan was a household name, Austin was not. Housewives knew who Hogan was. If you're judging pops during shows then you could say a lot of wrestlers would qualify. In the 80's, the 1st few WM were insanely popular amongst everyone, not just wrestling fans. Every bar would be packed during a PPV when Hogan would headline every show and when Hogan lost his title to Andre, it was on NBC in primetime and the ratings were thru the roof, ratings that were easily double of the best ever rated RAW show. The anticipation and reaction for WM1 thru to WM 6 was comparable to the biggest boxing PPV's.

                Every house show (and back then there were house shows every 3 weeks in the bigger cities, not twice a year in the late 90's) would be an automatic sellout if Hogan was wrestling. In Toronto they had a regular house show in our baseball stadium when Hogan fought Paul Orndorff and almost 70 000 people were there. And I don't even need to go into Hulkamania merchendise sales in the 80's which every other wrestler in history would pale in comparison to Hogan.

                For the 1st year of Austin's run the WWE still was lagging behind Nitro in the ratings and only started to overtake them when Vince became more involved in the story lines.
                Last edited by Seymour Scagnetti; 10-14-2012, 05:23 PM.

                Comment

                • 55
                  Banned
                  • Mar 2006
                  • 20857

                  #23
                  Re: At Their Peak, Who Was Hottest/Most Popular?

                  Originally posted by jpup
                  Austin was the biggest draw at his peak than any wrestler in history.
                  That's not even remotely close to being true.

                  Comment

                  • Bellsprout
                    Hard Times.
                    • Oct 2009
                    • 25652

                    #24
                    Re: At Their Peak, Who Was Hottest/Most Popular?

                    Originally posted by 55
                    Unless you're over 30 it would be hard to understand how HUGE Hulkamania was in the mid 80s. The guy got 93,000+ people to show up IN PERSON to watch him wrestle. Nobody else can say that. A lot of guys have been "over" but Hogan was beyond that. He singlehandedly brought pro wrestling into mainstream popular culture.

                    And this is coming from a guy whose favorite wrestler of all-time is Ric Flair.
                    Just to play devil's advocate, since I agree that it's Hogan...

                    Has anybody else ever had the opportunity to get 93,000 people to show up to see them? If they had bothered to put Wrestlemania at a building that size during Austin's heyday as the top draw, I would bet they probably would have gotten that amount of people to go to it.

                    I mean, Rock (and Cena, but probably more Rock) just put 79,000 people in Sun Life Stadium, but for all we know it might have been 100,000 if the building had allowed it.

                    And I'm sure that they're going to get at least 100,000 for Mania next year.

                    It's a great accomplishment, no doubt, but I just wonder if it's unprecedented simply because nobody else has had the chance to do it.
                    Member: OS Uni Snob Association | Twitter: @MyNameIsJesseG | #WT4M | #WatchTheWorldBurn
                    Originally posted by l3ulvl
                    A lot of you guys seem pretty cool, but you have wieners.

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                    • Seymour Scagnetti
                      Banned
                      • Oct 2006
                      • 2489

                      #25
                      Re: At Their Peak, Who Was Hottest/Most Popular?

                      Originally posted by Dayman
                      Just to play devil's advocate, since I agree that it's Hogan...

                      Has anybody else ever had the opportunity to get 93,000 people to show up to see them? If they had bothered to put Wrestlemania at a building that size during Austin's heyday as the top draw, I would bet they probably would have gotten that amount of people to go to it.

                      I mean, Rock (and Cena, but probably more Rock) just put 79,000 people in Sun Life Stadium, but for all we know it might have been 100,000 if the building had allowed it.

                      And I'm sure that they're going to get at least 100,000 for Mania next year.

                      It's a great accomplishment, no doubt, but I just wonder if it's unprecedented simply because nobody else has had the chance to do it.
                      Last year was different because the Rock was coming back from years of acting so the interest was there for nostalgic reasons and I don't know how expensive the cheapest seats were last year but I saw WM6 in the Toronto Skydome when Hulk fought the Ultimate Warrior and there was 65 000 people and I had bleacher seats and paid a lot for them and had to wait in line for hours to get them. I remember the whole stadium being sold out within a couple of days. I doubt that was the case for the most recent WM where a lot of the cheap seats were probably papered to fill out the stadium.

                      Hogan could generate insane interest just fighting guys on the WWE roster. When Austin was at his peak, he fought guys like the Rock and Michaels (and needed Tyson as referee to generate interest) in smaller arenas because the WWE knew they couldn't fill a 70000 seat stadium at that time.

                      And when WM was in Toronto about 10 years ago, it was sold out but the crowd was there to see Hogan against the Rock and the crowd popping for that match easily confirmed that. I think Austin fought Scott Hall or Kevin Nash back then and you could barely hear the crowd for that match. The Hogan match stole the show and Hogan was supposed to be the heel. If you saw it then you saw that Rock became the heel in the middle of the match because he was being booed so much and Hogan was being insanely cheered. It was pretty funny to watch because even Rock couldn't figure out what was going on and he knew he had to adlib heel behaviour midstream because he didn't want to look stupid acting like a face while being booed and the Rock was normally very popular in Toronto. At least 90% of the crowd was cheering for Hogan.

                      That match pretty much confirmed Hogan was king. In fact from memory I think one of the rumours back then was Austin didn't want to fight Hogan at that WM because he was afraid what happened to the Rock with the crowd would happen to him even though Hogan was willing to do the job like he did for the Rock which the crowd did not like and gave Hogan a standing ovation afterwards.
                      Last edited by Seymour Scagnetti; 10-18-2012, 01:04 AM.

                      Comment

                      • 55
                        Banned
                        • Mar 2006
                        • 20857

                        #26
                        Re: At Their Peak, Who Was Hottest/Most Popular?

                        Also, there was no prime time TV for the WWF back in 1987 and it was much tougher to promote than it is now.

                        Drawing 93k to a city like Detroit to see a pro wrestling match in 1987 would be like drawing 150k now.

                        Comment

                        • kingkilla56
                          Hall Of Fame
                          • Jun 2009
                          • 19395

                          #27
                          Re: At Their Peak, Who Was Hottest/Most Popular?

                          This reminds me of guys in the sports forums arguing who was better between eras without accounting for the changes in our culture over those periods of time.

                          I missed out on Hulkamania so yeah. Excluding him Ive never seen anybody get as much love from my base like the Rock and Austin, but Id give it to the Rock for his, what 3 year run? He was something else.
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                          • Seymour Scagnetti
                            Banned
                            • Oct 2006
                            • 2489

                            #28
                            Re: At Their Peak, Who Was Hottest/Most Popular?

                            Originally posted by 55
                            Also, there was no prime time TV for the WWF back in 1987 and it was much tougher to promote than it is now.

                            Drawing 93k to a city like Detroit to see a pro wrestling match in 1987 would be like drawing 150k now.
                            And back then WM main events were set up less than 6 weeks in advance. The Rock/Cena match was set up a year in advance. I remember Hogan being on Piper's Pit on one of those saturday afternoon taped shows and Andre walked on with Heenen showing that he turned heel and grabbed Hogan by the scruff of his neck and the match was set for 6 or 7 weeks later. None of those 6 months worth of promos hyping the match.

                            Comment

                            • Seymour Scagnetti
                              Banned
                              • Oct 2006
                              • 2489

                              #29
                              Re: At Their Peak, Who Was Hottest/Most Popular?

                              Originally posted by kingkilla56
                              This reminds me of guys in the sports forums arguing who was better between eras without accounting for the changes in our culture over those periods of time.

                              I missed out on Hulkamania so yeah. Excluding him Ive never seen anybody get as much love from my base like the Rock and Austin, but Id give it to the Rock for his, what 3 year run? He was something else.
                              While I envy your young age (at least a lot younger than me) nothing beat pro wrestling in the 80's and start of the 90's and I watched alot of wrestling in the attitude era. It was so much fun back then and you didn't have the internet to announce every new wrestler coming in. So when a guy like Macho Man or Undertaker arrived, you knew virtually nothing about him so it kept everything fresh for new guys coming in.

                              Comment

                              • Redacted01
                                Hall Of Fame
                                • Aug 2007
                                • 10316

                                #30
                                Re: At Their Peak, Who Was Hottest/Most Popular?

                                Originally posted by Seymour Scagnetti
                                Last year was different because the Rock was coming back from years of acting so the interest was there for nostalgic reasons and I don't know how expensive the cheapest seats were last year but I saw WM6 in the Toronto Skydome when Hulk fought the Ultimate Warrior and there was 65 000 people and I had bleacher seats and paid a lot for them and had to wait in line for hours to get them. I remember the whole stadium being sold out within a couple of days. I doubt that was the case for the most recent WM where a lot of the cheap seats were probably papered to fill out the stadium.
                                They seem to mention every year that Wrestlemania tickets sell out within hours on the Monday after they go on sale. Now maybe they have multiple releases now so that isn't entirely true, just that they sell out the first release.

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