Talk about it here.

Last few minutes. Stupidest finish ever, as Jimmy Hart turns his jacket inside out to show referee stripes so he can count the fall, and Hogan and Beefcake actually think it is going to count.

Like I said, in retrospect, all of this looks like it's out of 1995 WCW. God, mid-90's Hogan was unbearable.

I remember when I first got around to watching this show I thought this match was pretty brutally bad. I also remember Beefcake being in for way longer than you'd probably want, but I thought to myself "Okay I know Hogan comes out and wins the title, I guess they are saving him for that". Of course then when we get to that it's punch punch big boot leg drop the end. So... no, not really.

 

Not the strongest Wrestlemania ever. Hell my most memorable thing might be Luger's entrance.

Easily top 10 shittiest finishes ever and that covers a lot of ground. Somehow I bet Hogan would end up involved with a few of them.

They do a stupid visual fall of Jimmy Hart reversing his jacket to black and white stripes and pretending to be referee. Hogan and Beefcake gets disqualified for using a weapon. Hogan and Beefcake threaten to beat up the referee. Such nice guys. Hogan does his posing to such a poor reaction from crowd. Though they do pop for the chance to get money. Desperation like.

One of those bullshit finishes I talked about in the Opening Ceremony thread. You're not bringing back Hogan to lose and he's not winning the tag belts either, so book a shitty DQ (with Hogan losing, but nevermind). The goofy stuff with Hart's jacket and the beating up of Danny Davis are just icing on the cake. What heroes. Hogan always played by his own rules, kayfabe-wise, but this was the start of Hogan's on-screen character being a self-entitled egomaniac whose actions could no longer be defended.

We jump to Beefcake hot tagging Hogan, who lays out Dibiase & IRS after a ref bump. Jimmy Hart flips his jacket to reveal referee stripes and counts the pin after an eternity. They take the tag belts but another ref is out who revives Hebner and its called a DQ. Hogan celebrates and cups ears with Beefcake & Hart in the ring. An absolute ridiculous amount of time wasted on that. They open Money Inc's briefcase with a brick and cash, and hand some money to people ringside. Hogan interview backstage afterwards. His eye is gross. Challenges the winner of Hart-Yoko, he wants Hart or the Jap. Well this was certainly terrible.

I always hated the finish to this match even as a kid and this gets worse every time. Why they thought they won the title because Hart just turned his jacket inside out I will ever know.

Where do we begin?

 

I'm actually not all that disturbed by the "Jimmy Hart turns referee" stuff. This is the same promotion which allowed the Junkyard Dog to count his own pinfall on Moondog Spot at the Wrestling Classic when the ref for that match was apparently late to the ring, so why not have a manager attempt to count a fall for his team at Mania?

 

The Danny Davis stuff was a hundred times worse. I don't give a shit in Sheboygan whose manager Jimmy is, him throwing Davis, who used to be an actual wrestler, over the top rope like yesterday's trash was the most ridiculous thing I've seen yet. If you want to do something like that, have Hogan do it himself. It may sound like a stupid thing to get mad at compared to what else went on during this whole mess of a card, but you can't even concoct a bad excuse for it.

 

Thank heaven the announcers didn't try to sell this as right. Even Savage, who's supposed to be the babyface color guy here, seemed to respect the decision to DQ Hogan and Beefcake (our portion of the match picked up after the ref bump, so we didn't get to see what actually caused the DQ). We all know Vince would have been demanding the ref's head on a pike for daring to disqualify a man who's been as put upon as Beefcake has been, and of course no one would dare disqualify the Immortal Hulk Hogan.

 

I have no idea who booked a losing Hogan posedown to go on as long as it did. My guess is that someone thought it was better than just having an intermission with nothing else going on, but the announcers were left scrambling for stuff to say, since they were obligated to call a segment which didn't even feature much posing until almost the end. They should have had a brief celebration, then gone right to handing Teddy's money out, which really seemed to pop the crowd.

 

If there's one thing celebrities like Natalie Cole don't need, it's money. even money passed out by a real live honest-to-God WWF Superstar. Thank God Hogan missed her, although she certainly sounded like she wanted some in the interview. Heenan's begging, on the other hand was hilarious as always.

 

Savage was a true pro here; from the way he put over Hogan and Beefcake you would have never guessed that he was the one responsible for Hogan's black eye just hours before. Nice save by Hogan during his interview by claiming that people working for Money Inc. gave it to him instead.

 

The rest of his promo was nothing special, although I thought words like "Jap" were considered politically incorrect by 1993. Then again, this is Hogan we're talking about, and rules don't always apply to Immortals.

 

Line of the Night goes to Savage: "The Megamaniacs are the Megamaniacs!" See, Vince? That's what happens when posediowns run too long.

If you can put the godawful booking to the back of your mind, this match wasn't bad at all. Hogan, Beefcake and Dibiase have all worked with each other hundreds of times before this and can pull out something solid that the crowd eat up, even if it's not all that interesting. Beefcake is decent enough as a face in peril. The first bit of bad booking when the referee decides that he has the power to strip Money Inc. of their titles if they don't get back in the ring. The finish with Jimmy Hart turning his jacket inside out to count the pin was seriously dumb and made the babyfaces look like utter morons.

★★¼