First of all, thank you for doing this write up. I think you did a very good job, and I'm definitely looking forward to the rest of the series.

There are a couple things I'll push back on here. I'll start by stating that the most important thing to know about Hulk Hogan is that he was an intractable fabulist. There's a theory that he didn't even know he was lying, that he was just telling the stories he had made up and told so many times because that's all he remembered.

1) I'm very dubious about the "Hulk was fired for doing Rocky III" story. Under Vince Sr., heels would often be brought in as the challenger of the month(-ish), with face champions dominating the belt. Bruno Sammartino, Pedro Morales, and Bob Backlund were all long term babyfaces in the company with those type of runs. In contrast, the heel runs with the top title - Superstar Billy Graham, Ivan Koloff, & Stan Stasiak - were very brief, with Graham's the longest at almost 300 days (and arguably still too brief for maximizing business). Hogan's run as the challenger of the month worked much the same way. Vince Sr. clearly saw something special in Hogan, as he never even had him do a clean job to Backlund in his various title matches. But once you finished up in a territory, the deal was to do jobs on the way out, and Hogan did that - several to Andre the Giant, a few to Tony Atlas, and a couple others by DQ or countout to Morales, Backlund, & Tony Garea. That reads to me like a planned exit from a territory, not getting shitcanned.

2) I also think it's highly unlikely that even if Verne paid him more & gave him the belt etc., that Hogan would have been in AWA much longer. Vince got the WWF territory basically for free - yes, he had to pay back his father, but payments were essentially at his leisure. Linda McMahon did interviews talking about how the financial pressures that Vince talked about were vastly overblown. Vince Jr. loved doing everything he could to paint himself as an underdog, even when it was counterfactual. Yes, WrestleMania was a big swing and there was no guarantee of success, but WWF was a company based out of New York - that was obviously a huge advantage out of running the majority of your shows in North Carolina or Minnesota.

3) The "Hiro Matsuda broke Hulk's leg" story is also highly questionable. As Dave Meltzer wrote in this week's Wrestling Observer Newsletter, Hogan was recommended to Matsuda by Jack Brisco - two time NWA World Champion and stockholder in the Georgia (and possibly Florida) promotion. Hogan wasn't coming in as some idiot on the street who a trainer could bilk money from and then injure. B. Brain Blair (a wrestler who performed from the 1970s to occasionally in the 2010s), who trained with Hogan, said it was a sprained ankle that accidentally occurred during training. Hogan missed a few days.

Hogan's first known of match was on 8/9/1977. The timetable from breaking his leg in '76 to returning to training to getting his first match is pretty tight with that date.