Hulk Hogan Was Supposed To Host WrestleMania 36

It doesn’t take a genius to see why WWE asked Hulk Hogan to host WrestleMania 37. Not only is the controversial legend still beloved by many, but co-hosting with Titus O’Neil is good for mainstream PR.

Hogan recently appeared on Corey Graves’ After The Bell podcast to hype his hosting of this year’s show, and he revealed that he actually was asked to host last year before the pandemic saw an end to those plans, and Rob Gronkowski was drafted in to host instead.

“I mean this is a huge statement. WWE, once again, raising the bar on how things should be played out from this point on. I was devastated last year, you know, I talked to the upper hierarchy at the WWE and they asked me to host WrestleMania last year everything went awry. Gronk did a great job, but I mean, as I watched it, there was like a hole in my heart because there was no crowd and it was so different you know what I prayed that it would never happen again.

“So all of a sudden to be back out there in front of this crowd. that was my thing man to listen to the crowd, to feed off the crowd I mean everything that I ever did had to do with a crowd, you know, I didn’t need to anything else so that crowd just makes Hulk Hogan go crazy, it makes Hollywood Hogan go crazy, and the WWE Superstars just raise the bar on their performance once they get in the ring in front of that crowd so this is going to be off the charts this WrestleMania.”

He continued to say that it feels like an “ultimate high” for him, because he’s lived in Florida for 67 years, and he believes the local fans will be very happy to see him.

“This is going to be the ultimate high for me because I’ve lived here 67 years. I’m not some newcomer who just moved here 20 years ago. I’ve been here and I’ve seen all the changes and these people know me. They know my history. They know the good, they know the bad. They know I’m just a normal guy running around here in Tampa and at the end of the day, the scars and everything I’ve been through, these people in Tampa know me. So this is really going to be cool for the WWE. That’s what I’m praying for. I hope it’s just so intense that it blows everybody away, including Vince McMahon.”

WrestleTalk will be providing live coverage of both nights of WrestleMania 37, so be sure to check that out next weekend.

Thanks to Fightful for the transcript.

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• titus o'neil
• WrestleMania 37
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