Our journey through the history of this championship brings us to Hulk Hogan, without whom most of us would not care about wrestling. Also without whom many of us would not be so embarrassed about enjoying wrestling today. We’re going to get his entire megastar WWF run out of the way here. WWF has left the NWA for good, so we’re back to having a world championship.
January 23, 1984 – New York, New York
Hulk Hogan def. Iron Sheik {WWF World Heavyweight Championship Match}
From WWF on MSG. This was a really basic match, only notable for Hogan cheating the way Sheik did in his match against Backlund. It’s only 5:40 long and you’ve probably seen it, so you don’t need me to say much else about it. I was born about a week and a half later, so I really never stood a chance against the power of Hulkamania. *¾
February 5, 1988 – Indianapolis, Indiana
Andre the Giant def. Hulk Hogan {WWF World Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the Main Event. It’s pretty amazing how much glossier WWF became between Hogan’s title win and his loss. This match was pretty bad outside of the insane crowd heat. I’m kind of surprised that trash didn’t get thrown into the ring, especially given the remarkably screwy finish (Andre hit a suplex and got the three at 9:08, even though Hogan kicked out at 1). Andre immediately wrapped the title around Ted DiBiase’s waste, which led to the title being vacated shortly thereafter. DiBiase was never recognized as champion officially, though he was once on television announced as the champion during a tag team match. Anyway, Hogan sees that there were two twin referees and loses it. Given the way Hogan was always doing things like attacking before the bell and roughing up guys much smaller than him, I’m surprised he was never booed during this era. *½
March 27, 1988 – Atlantic City, New Jersey
Randy Savage def. Ted DiBiase {WWF World Heavyweight Championship Match}
From WrestleMania IV. There was just nothing happening in this match. The crowd only wanted Hogan, so for as much as I see people retroactively shitting on Hogan’s interference it was what they needed in order to get heat. But inside the ring this was as basic as it gets, with Savage winning at 9:27. **
April 2, 1989 – Atlantic City, New Jersey
Hulk Hogan def. Randy Savage {WWF World Heavyweight Championship Match}
From WrestleMania V. The worst part of these early WrestleMania matches is seeing Donald Trump in the front row. Like Hogan vs. Andre, this was fueled by insane crowd heat and wasn’t much beyond that. History and nostalgia have influenced people’s opinions about the match, but it’s neither guy’s finest work. The finish was particularly lame, as Hogan popped up after the elbow (which came after a very long stretch of Savage dominating) and quickly hit the big boot and legdrop for the pin at 17:54. It just felt tacked on and unearned. ***¼
April 1, 1990 – Toronto, Ontario
Ultimate Warrior def. Hulk Hogan {WWF Championship Match}
From WrestleMania VI, and I’m not sure why WWF took the ‘World Heavyweight’ out of the title when they changed the belt here, especially since the belt still said ‘World Heavyweight’ on it. It wasn’t until they graduated to the larger belt that those words were removed, but the announcers simply called it the World Wrestling Federation Championship for over a decade from here. As much as it paints me to say this, this had the god vs. god vibe that today feels absent from the year before. A lot of that was because Hogan treated Warrior like an equal, not a guy who was winning by cheating and then easily dispatched once control was retaken. The double knucklelock bit is still as ridiculous as ever, though. It wasn’t amazing, but it was interesting to see Hogan have to do something different because Warrior had a good portion of the crowd behind him. The finish was pretty hot, and Hogan continued the tradition of kicking out immediately after the three count (at 22:51) that the early champions seemed to love. ***¼
January 19, 1991 – Miami, Florida
Sergeant Slaughter def. Ultimate Warrior {WWF World Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the fourth Royal Rumble. I fully understand that we were at war in Iraq at the time, but a red, white and blue Warrior tearing up an Iraqi flag (which was held by the Iranian Iron Sheik) is the cringiest thing in 2020. The match did have a solid energy to start and I like that Slaughter argued with the referee to stop Warrior from being counted out after Randy Savage attacked the champ. But everything after that sucked and this existed really just to set the table for WrestleMania. It took interference (and a crap Slaughter elbowdrop) to put Warrior down at 12:47, but credit to Warrior for resisting the urge to kick out at 3. *¾
March 24, 1991 – Los Angeles, California
Hulk Hogan def. Sergeant Slaughter {WWF Championship Match}
From WrestleMania VII. Having Hogan bleed here worked, as it was the only thing that ever made it seem like he might lose. But having this match go twenty minutes was insane. It was so repetitive. The crowd got pretty damn quiet before Hogan got color. Slaughter had the nerve to kick out at 3 at 20:26, which is also insane. **
November 27, 1991 – Detroit, Michigan
The Undertaker def. Hulk Hogan {WWF Championship Match}
From the fifth annual Survivor Series. This was somehow more boring than the Slaughter matches. Undertaker was all chokes at this point. Flair showing up to help Undertaker win at 12:45 with a chair made the new champ look weak in hindsight. When I was watching this at 7 years old though I somehow ignored all that and thought Undertaker was the most powerful and scary wrestler ever. This is one of the worst title changes in the history of the title, probably second only to an awful match in 2008. *
December 3, 1991 – San Antonio, Texas
Hulk Hogan def. The Undertaker {WWF Championship Match}
From This Tuesday in Texas. This was better than the first match, but not by a lot. Given that we never got a high-profile Hogan vs. Flair match in WWF, a lot of this seemed pointless. That Undertaker fella made it through okay, though. Hogan threw ashes in Undertaker’s eyes and rolled him up at 13:09 for the win. But not for long because WWF President Jack Tunney saw the whole thing thanks to Flair and the title was held up. That of course makes no sense, as Tunney would have seen Undertaker cheating at Survivor Series on a monitor or replay and did nothing. Why would it matter if he saw it in person, especially considering he didn’t strip Hogan of the title until days later? **
January 19, 1992 – Albany, New York
Ric Flair def. Hulk Hogan, Jake Roberts, Roddy Piper, El Matador, Greg Valentine, Skinner, The Barbarian, Virgil, Jimmy Snuka, Jerry Sags, Sgt. Slaughter, Randy Savage, The Big Boss Man, Haku, The Undertaker, Shawn Michaels, Colonel Mustafa, The British Bulldog, Irwin R. Schyster, Rick Martel, Sid Justice, Ted DiBiase, The Texas Tornado, Repo Man, Nikolai Volkoff, Jim Duggan, The Warlord, Hercules, and The Berzerker {WWF Championship Royal Rumble Match}
For the vacant title at the fifth Royal Rumble. This lost a lot of steam when Bulldog went out. Up until that point there was a great pattern of Flair and a second heel trying to get him out of the ring. From there we got a couple great storyline moments, though the match was marred by a couple of long, boring stretches where too many guys were in the ring doing nothing. In the end, Hogan was a poor sport and helped Flair eliminate Sid at 62:02 to win the title. ****¼
April 5, 1992 – Indianapolis, Indiana
Randy Savage def. Ric Flair {WWF Championship Match}
From WrestleMania VIII. This was Flair at his dickish best and Savage selling like a king. It was the perfect culmination of the scumbag playboy Flair storyline. Recently, Flair has said that he didn’t think this match was very good because of Savage’s personal issues at the time, and that he never had an amazing match in WWF/E. I couldn’t disagree more. Flair said he wanted this to be on the level of his match and Savage’s matches against Steamboat, and I think that’s just an unreasonable ask. Those are considered some of the best matches in the entire history of wrestling. This might not be on that level by most people’s count, but I’ve watched this many more times than I’ve watched any of those. It’s one of my top 5 matches ever, and never dips out of that list. Savage rolled up Flair with a handful of tights for the win at 18:04. ****¾
September 1, 1992 – Hershey, Pennsylvania
Ric Flair def. Randy Savage {WWF Championship Match}
From Prime Time Wrestling. Maybe Flair’s brains are scrambled today and he’s referring to this match when he talks about disappointment. This certainly was a major letdown after the Savage title win. It had a good story but it was incredibly one-dimensional. When babyfaces lost titles in WWE around this time the heels had to throw everything but the kitchen sink at him to get the belt. That happened here with Razor Ramon interfering and a figure four that lasted several minutes before Savage passed out and got counted to the mat at 15:56. ***¼
October 12, 1992 – Saskatoon, Saskatchewan
Bret Hart def. Ric Flair {WWF Championship Match}
From some house show, watchable on Smack ‘Em Whack ‘Em. This was a refreshing change of pace. It was a very sound technical match. It lacked drama, but made up for that in clever touches here and there as both guys looked to injure the other’s leg. Hart putting the figure four on Flair made me giggle. It was probably five to ten minutes too long at 26:13, and it’s so odd that this happened on a house show. Was it so important that he win the title in Canada? I just can’t wrap my head around the business of wrestling from the ‘60s until essentially the Attitude Era. ***¾
April 4, 1993 – Las Vegas, Nevada
Yokozuna def. Bret Hart {WWE World Heavyweight Championship Match}
From WrestleMania IX. The finish of this match is trash, but otherwise it’s actually damned solid. The nerve holds were an annoying staple of Yokozuna matches, but aside from those things they built a dramatic match that had Hart overcoming an insane obstacle. Salt to the eyes leading to a pin at 8:55 is lame though. **½
Hulk Hogan def. Yokozuna {WWF Championship Match}
So Hogan comes out to defend Hart’s honor and gets himself a title match in doing so. Yeesh. The match is 22 seconds long. It is what it is and there’s not much to say about it outside of the political nonsense of the whole thing. Also there was no opening bell so we’re all just guessing at the official length. N/A
June 13, 1993 – Dayton, Ohio
Yokozuna def. Hulk Hogan {WWF Championship Match}
From the first King of the Ring PPV. This wasn’t as bad as I was dreading. It wasn’t great, and it was very basic, but it wasn’t outright boring. Yokozuna kicking out of the legdrop, winning with the legdrop, and Hogan not kicking out after three (at 13:09) was about as much as Hogan has ever put anyone over that I can remember. The fireball was a cool effect too. **¼
And that about did it for Hulk Hogan for the next eight and a half years. With him gone, Hart and Shawn Michaels stepped up and dominated the main event, finding themselves in all but two matches featured in the next part of this series.
From Diamond Ring Kensuke Office Changes. They emphasize that Nakajima beat Dragon Gate wrestler Kenichiro Arai 
From Dynamite 131. This is a qualifying match for the Owen Hart Foundation tournament. Joe debuted at ROH Supercard of Honor, saving Jonathan Gresham from Jay Lethal (whose soul searching apparently led him to turn heel) & Sonjay Dutt after the main event. And now that ROH and AEW are the same thing, that seems worth mentioning. Caster’s pre-match rap was cute. This was real squashy, with Joe needing only two minutes to put Caster down with the Muscle Buster at 2:52. Lethal & Dutt pop up on the big screens and Lethal says he’d been trying to get a hold of Joe during his difficult soul searching time, and Joe never picked up. They have a present for Joe next week. N/A
From Dynamite 132. Jay Lethal & Sonjay Dutt were in the front row cheering on Joe. Sarcastically, probably, as they brawled with Joe at ROH Supercard of Honor XV. 
From Rampage 39. 
From Dynamite 137. 
From Dynamite 138. This is a 
From Double or Nothing. 
From PWF York Cougar Football Fundraiser. I didn't know that this match happened until over a month after the fact. This started out as a non-title match, but we'll get to why I've listed it as a title match in a moment. FTR have Mick Foley in their corner while their opponents have Bill Behrens. I’ve never actually seen Behrens do an on-camera gig before. He's holding a tennis racket, presumably as an Umaga to Jim Cornette. But it's confusing because there was actually a tennis player named Bill Behrens. They announce this match as having a 20-minute time limit. Only 11 minutes in, they say there are three minutes remaining. Until then, this was as run-of-the-mill as a modern FTR match gets. But the announcement snapped everyone out of their heat-on-Wheeler funk and forced them to go for desperate pins. They announce ten seconds remaining a couple of times, but no one can get the roll up pin they're looking for. The 20-minute time limit expires at 1
From NXT UK 183. McGuinness started by essentially saying that Fraser is going to pee or poo himself during the match. Unnecessary. Had Shawn Michaels been game to have a good match against Vader, this is what it would have looked like. Actually, a more appropriate and modern analogue is Brock Lesnar vs. Seth Rollins from SummerSlam. Much like that match, Frazer used quick strikes and avoided his larger opponent’s signature big move to stay alive. Here it was the powerbomb whereas there it was suplexes. Here, Frazer also successfully damaged WALTER’s knee, which slowed the big man down and made it hard for WALTER to hit the powerbomb. Unfortunately for Frazer, WALTER was able to bide his time and clothesline Frazer’s legs out from under him. An inevitable powerbomb followed and won the match for WALTER at 14:02. I hate to say this because I’m happy that he’s healthier, but the way WALTER has slimmed down has taken some of the magic away from his aura. At least for me it has. That said, dude can clearly still go as well as ever in the ring. ****
From NXT 659. Strong was feeling it here, which is thanks in large part to the crowd being maniacally loud from the get go I’m sure. His whole game was fast and devastating stick and move attacks. That worked pretty well, as WALTER was dazed from time to time. But as with all good WALTER matches (which is pretty much all WALTER matches), everything WALTER does is devastating here so it takes very little for him to take back control. And eventually he did just that and hit the powerbomb for the win at 9:46 (shown of 12:18). After the match, WALTER gets on the microphone and says that his name is Gunther now. I did not think WALTER would be a victim of the renaming curse this far into his run. What will they rename Strong?! ***¾
From NXT UK 185. Andy Shepherd helpfully announces from inside the ring that the reason for the stipulation is that the feud has gotten so violent that it wouldn’t be safe to have fans around. Devlin says during the match that it’s because he thinks Dragunov could only muster the energy to win if he had the crowd behind him. I like that explanation a lot more. The only real reason I could think of to do this without fans is that there was a scheduling conflict with one of the wrestlers for the regular TV taping date and they needed to get this thing filmed. We just had such a long stretch of empty arena NXT UK episodes that I can’t imagine anyone was dying to get another taste of it. This aired the day after Adam Cole vs. Orange Cassidy in a match that was also no disqualification and falls count anywhere, and this served up everything I felt was missing from that match. Now you might say, “Brad, Cassidy is not the same kind of character as Devlin or Dragunov, how could you expect the same level of violence or intensity?” To that I say, when Cassidy started his match by breaking his own sunglasses and rapidly punching Cole, he was indicating that level of violence and/or intensity. And instead the match was mostly wacky. Anyway, this was not wacky. It was stiff and intense and featured weapons that made sense and spots the didn’t take forever to set up. Dragunov got in trouble when his eye injury acted up. Devlin took control and beat the crap out of him. I wasn’t wild about how meek Dragunov was when Devlin was zip tying his hands, but I did like that in the end it turned out to be an error on Devlin’s part anyway because Dragunov’s finisher requires no hands. And indeed, a bound Dragunov jumped off the steel steps (which had been brought into the ring) and hit the Torpedo Moskau on Devlin for the win at 21:43. NXT UK is still sneaking in these dope matches that no one is watching. Y’all should watch them. ****¼ 
From AAA Triplemania Regia. FTR come out with Vickie Guerrero. This was supposed to be explained at an earlier AAA taping but FTR and Guerrero all missed them. AAA is notorious for having this kind of luck/being incompetent lately. FTR is also wearing Eddie Guerrero tribute tights, with American flags on one side and flames on the other, I suppose to pay homage to his Gringos Locos and Latino Heat gimmicks. This match mostly sucked, but one cool spot saw FTR tie Pentagon’s mask to the ropes and force him to unmask with his hands over his face to stop them from climbing the ladder. That would have been a very meaningful moment to lead up to the Lucha Brothers winning the titles back, but unfortunately instead it led into nothing. He just got his mask back and the match continued on in its lame, derivative way. At one point, Pentagon was the only man standing, but instead of climbing the ladder he grabbed a table from the floor. So the titles mean enough to him that he’d unmask to stop his opponents from winning, but not enough for him to get the titles when he had a clear path to do it? Vickie powered Pentagon, causing him to voluntarily jump through the table and Harwood grabbed the belts at 12:12. This was abysmal. *
From AEW Full Gear. Silver was hamming it up a lot more here than he was the year before in New York. That said, this had stronger just-a-match vibes than the aforementioned match. After Silver ripped out Cassidy’s pockets, Cassidy turned up the heat and these guys put on a middle of the row undercard match. Not bad by any means, but nothing memorable either. Cassidy hit the Beach Break rather out of nowhere for the win at 9:42. **¾ 
From the second Honor Reigns Supreme. The commentators sold this as Gresham getting a big shot against a top ROH guy after being an also-ran in the Television Championship division for a while. This was terrific. Both guys did a fantastic job selling their respective targeted limbs, and Gresham in particular played the role of the tenacious underdog perfectly. He didn’t just watch to see where Lethal would have trouble executing his finisher because of the damage he’d done to the former ROH Champion’s arm, he pressed the assault whenever he could, taking out the arm to make sure the Lethal Injection would never come. But what he couldn’t do was stop Lethal from battering his knee and ultimately winning with a Figure 4 Leglock at 17:54. ****¼ 
From the second Masters of the Craft. Columbus has way more Gresham fans than Concord did. That’s a neat little advancement to the plot, innit? They both went after the same limbs that earned them dividends in their previous match. And then they went ahead and built an incredible match out of that story. At first it seemed as though Lethal wasn’t going to be able to get Gresham’s leg to give out. But about halfway through the match, Gresham’s knee was in trouble. Gresham was able to escape the leglock this time by using the momentum of Lethal pulling him away from the ropes to shift to an armbar. But Gresham’s focus on the arm bit him in the ass. Lethal went for the Lethal Injection and collapsed again, but when Gresham went for a roll up after that Lethal cut back on it for the win at 18:27. This is one of the best American examples that I've seen of a match building on the match that came before. Rather than try to outdo the maneuvers from their first meeting for the sake of a big crowd reaction, they adjust their game plans in logical ways that, to me, were just as exciting. I think this match is slept on, by virtue of the fact that I’ve never heard anything about it before watching it. ****½ 
From ROH Wrestling 364. In real life, 
From Death Before Dishonor XVII. Gresham and Lethal had been teaming, but Gresham grew frustrated and started heeling. Ultimately, he turned on Lethal. It took them a little while to get there, but once they got into a groove this was exactly what I wanted from this match. It was back to their old tricks, with Lethal targeting the leg to set up for the Figure 4 Leglock and Gresham targeting the arm to block the Lethal Injection and set up for his Octopus. In the end, Lethal tried the cutback trick that worked for him in Columbus, but Gresham countered to a pin and then put on the gnarliest Octopus for his first win over Lethal at 17:20. This is the best kind of wrestling series. And none of it felt stale because it was a year after they’d wrestled last and because they found ways to energize the old tropes. And that’s not to mention Gresham busting out what I can only describe as a sumo-style assault. Gresham and Lethal make up after the match. ****
From ROH Wrestling 500. During the pandemic, ROH made the most of their empty arena shows by kicking them off with a tournament to crown a champion for the revived Pure Championship. Gresham won the tournament, and this was his fourth defense of the title. Lethal and Gresham were still allies here. In an interesting move, the other match on this milestone episode was two other partners fighting in Jay and Mark Briscoe. They cut to a commercial break about six minutes in, though the action didn’t get beyond (admittedly fast-moving) mat wrestling until the 10-minute mark. That had me thinking this was going to go long, but things took a different turn. Both guys had abused the other’s shoulders, and Lethal used that to his advantage best. He forced Gresham to use his first rope break to stop a pin, and his second to escape a crab. Then, he used the failed Lethal Injection to bait Gresham into a crossface, forcing the champ to use his final rope break. But he made the mistake of giving Gresham a breather and was quickly caught in a head scissor takedown giving Gresham the winning pin at 14:06 (shown of 16:40). For an empty arena match, this held my attention. It was totally different than their previous matches while still using a couple elements from the rivalry to elevate it just a bit. Not essential viewing, but if you’re working your way through their series you shouldn’t skip it. ***¼ 
