How will WWE handle Roddy Piper tribute on RAW without Hulk Hogan?
With the death of ‘Rowdy’ Roddy Piper, how will WWE show tribute to the legend without involving Hulk Hogan.
Roddy Piper is gone. It’s been only a couple of days since wrestling fans heard then news that one of the most incendiary personalities in the history of the business passed away and those fans are still grieving the world’s loss of the “Rowdy” one. Perhaps WWE will look to give some closure on the August 3 episode of Monday Night Raw when they will almost surely pay tribute to Hot Rod.
Even with the sadness brought on by the death of Piper, one can’t escape the peculiarity of the timing. Not peculiarity in a sense of suspiciousness, but rather that Piper’s passing would happen within weeks of WWE’s biggest stars and someone whose career intertwined with Piper’s has been banned from the company and been scrubbed from almost every possible avenue involving WWE.
That person is of course Hulk Hogan. Hogan’s racists remarks from several years ago continue to hit airwaves every few days, none more disappointing and disgusting than the next. If you haven’t heard by now, the surfacing of this Hogan audio and his comments has led to his firing from WWE (including his post as a judge on Tough Enough), his removal from all over the website, and the assumed position of not mentioning Hogan or the scandal at all in programming.
Piper’s death and the inevitable tribute to him on RAW is where the ban on all things Hogan becomes tricky. After all, Hogan’s feud with Piper in the mid-80s was central to the first ever Wrestlemania. Not only did Hogan and Piper help kick off the inaugural show of what would become WWE’s biggest annual event, but their tag match at Wrestlemania I featuring Piper and Paul Orndorff vs. Hulk Hogan and Mr. T is one of the most iconic moments in WWE lore.
The major issue that arises is how the WWE will choose to honor Piper on their flagship show without having Hogan speak or, if they go this route, without even mentioning Hogan and subsequently the feud that led to Wrestlemania I.
Omitting Hogan entirely from a tribute to Piper would continue the image-related plight of WWE to remove Hogan from their product. In fairness, there’s a decade of Piper in his prime in WWE that doesn’t exclusively involve Hulk Hogan, but still highlights the prowess of Hot Rod as a performer. What’s unfair, though, is that omitting Hogan from the package subsequently overlooks what is one of the greatest moments of Piper’s career in regards to Wrestlemania I.
While there will certainly be backlash for doing so, it seems unfair to Piper and his legacy to not include footage from Wrestlemania I in a tribute. Seeing archived video of his feud with Roddy Piper from 1984-85 isn’t the same as having Hogan in for an interview to offer his current thoughts. Since Wrestlemania I and more of Hogan’s work in WWE is still available on the WWE Network (one of the only things he’s not scrubbed from), then using match footage and promos from that event and feud wouldn’t appear to be breaking their ban on Hogan. Rather than a glorification of Hogan, showing that video as merely a part of a tribute would be staying true to Piper and the legacy he left behind in WWE.
RAW on Monday Night and the expected tribute to Piper will be the first chance for fans to see how severe WWE’s severing of ties with Hogan really is. There’s a scenario where the tribute includes Hogan and another where it omits him entirely. Either way, people and fans are going to notice. So in the interest of honoring Piper and his contributions to the WWE, there’s no need for the company to scrap Wrestlemania I from a tribute. “Rowdy” Roddy Piper’s career is incomplete without that period and moment; Hulk Hogan’s comments—no matter how despicable—shouldn’t affect how WWE remembers and appreciates Hot Rod.