Imagine a world in which Hulk Hogan’s theme song wasn’t his

It’s as synonymous with Hulk Hogan as his finishing leg drop, but his entrance theme almost wasn’t his.

Wrestling fans who grew up in the ’80s were almost automatically fans of Hulk Hogan, since he came along just as television became a wider medium and the spectacle of WrestleMania was launched. Quite simply, Hogan became the WWF’s biggest star.

When “Real American” came on the arena speakers, everyone in attendance and watching knew who was coming to the ring. It was Hogan, typically in his conveniently tear-away tank top. The theme song, quite frankly, was as much a part of Hogan’s overall routine as his usual leg drop finishing move and liberal use of the word “brother.”

But, as Sports Illustrated‘s Jimmy Traina found out and featured in his Extra Mustard column on Thursday, it was almost not to be.

As it turns out, “Real American” was not originally Hogan’s entrance theme at all. He had been using Survivor’s “Eye of the Tiger,” as a surefire nod to his turn as “Thunderlips” in Rocky III, which had the song as its theme. “Real American” was instead first used by Mike Rotundo and Barry Windham, who were known together as the tag team U.S. Express.

Rotundo and Windham left WWF for the NWA pretty quickly after starting to use the song, and the rest is quite literally history.

But what if Hogan hadn’t been given “Real American” to enter to?

It’s safe to say Hogan would have still become a huge star, no matter what his theme song was. But “Real American” got the crowd going and the song added a layer to many of his matches, including the legendary WrestleMania match against Andre The Giant. And with another song, the appeal and mystique of Hogan’s character just wouldn’t have been quite the same.

The easy follow-up to Hogan not getting “Real American” as his theme song is who might have gotten it instead. That’s hard to pinpoint, but perhaps another wrestler would have created a character the song would’ve fit and used it as his or her own vehicle to super-stardom.

Thankfully, “Real American” became Hogan’s entrance theme and it became interlaced perfectly with his star persona. Sometimes things just work out the way they’re supposed to, to the point that the “Butterfly Effect” is hard to really imagine.