Hulk Hogan disposed of Sgt. Slaughter once and for all in August 1991. Around the same time, the legendary Ric Flair was engaged in a bitter battle with his WCW boss, Jim Herd.
“I hated working there,” Flair recalls nearly two decades later. “Herd was not living up to his word with me. He was a very difficult guy. Plus he had no wrestling knowledge at all. Ted [Turner] was famous for hiring guys to patch holes in his company. It was like that with his baseball team too. The Atlanta Braves struggled for years until they brought Bobby Cox in to manage. He was a real baseball coach and the reason for their success.”
Prior to being tapped as WCW’s executive vice president, Herd was working as a station manager at KPLR-TV in St. Louis, Missouri. He also served as a regional manager for Pizza Hut. Neither job gave Herd the training necessary to run a wrestling company, and it showed in his questionable matchmaking. It wasn’t long before Herd’s shoddy wrestling IQ caused his stars to look at him quizzically, including Stan Hansen and Road Warrior Animal, who ultimately left WCW because of Herd’s inability to grasp the business. Nobody in WCW, however, disliked Herd more than the Nature Boy.
Flair’s contract expired during the summer of 1991, but he continued to compete as WCW Champion while negotiating a new deal. At one point during the negotiations, Herd called Flair while he was on vacation in Daytona Beach and told him to get on a flight to Baltimore so he could defend the title against Lex Luger. Fearing his negotiating leverage would be significantly lessened if he were to lose to Luger, Flair refused, telling Herd he wasn’t going anywhere without a contract first.
Flair recalls an angered Herd screaming into the phone, “Do what I tell you or you will never wrestle again!” The Nature Boy laughed the threat off before ultimately suggesting he defend the title against Barry Windham instead, but not without a contract first. Again, Herd refused to grant Flair his wish.
After hanging up the phone, Flair began experiencing great amounts of guilt. He started to feel like he was letting his friends down, as well as the company he had worked for since 1974. So he called Herd to tell him he had changed his mind—he would compete against Windham without a contract.
“It’s too late, screw it!” Herd told him. “I’m sending [head of security] Doug Dillinger to your house to come get the belt.”
“Well, if he’s coming to get the belt, make sure he has a check for $36,000 on him, because that’s what you owe me. Otherwise, stick it up your ass,” Flair responded, referring to the $25,000 deposit WCW Champions were required to give to prevent them from leaving the company with the title. Plus, Flair wanted an additional $11,000 in interest.
“You don’t understand. Doug will be at your house to get the belt.”
“Let me explain something to you,” Flair countered. “Doug has been my friend for more than thirty years. I’ll greet him at the door and shake his hand. But once he asks for the belt, I’ll tell him to go screw himself. And then Doug will say, ‘I understand, no problem,’ before turning around and going back to work.”
The contentious conversation with Herd effectively ended Flair’s WCW tenure. But his career was far from over.
“As soon as I hung up the phone, I had a quiet talk with myself,” remembers Flair. “I said: ‘It’s now or never, Ric.’ So I called Vince. He didn’t believe me, though. He said, ‘Oh, God. I’ve heard this story before. Are you really going to come?’ I told him that I was and I wouldn’t be alone—I was bringing the WCW Championship with me.”
Later that day, Flair stuffed his WCW title into a FedEx box and overnighted it to McMahon. Soon after, Bobby Heenan began showing up on WWE television with the WCW title, claiming the “real” world champion was on his way. He never mentioned Flair by name, but once everybody saw the gigantic WCW Championship, they knew it couldn’t be anyone else.
Flair made his highly anticipated WWE debut in September 1991. Without hesitation, he targeted WWE Champion Hulk Hogan. “That belt that belongs to Hulk Hogan, as far as I’m concerned and the world’s concerned, is cheap,” said Flair during his initial WWE appearance. “It’s an imitation of the real thing. Sure Hogan, you’re the World Wrestling Federation Champion, but you’re not the real world champion. You’re not Ric Flair. Comparing what you own, the belt you have and the title you have, is like comparing prime rib to lunch meat.”
The first verbal barb in the historic Flair-Hogan rivalry had been tossed. For nearly a decade, fans had drooled over the thought of the two biggest names in sports-entertainment finally squaring off. Before the monumental dream match could occur, however, Hogan had some unfinished business to take care of with the undefeated Undertaker. With only one year of WWE service to his credit the Deadman was still considered a relative newcomer, but he had already shown great promise, highlighted by a dominating performance over Jimmy Snuka at WrestleMania VII.
The Hulkster and Undertaker battled at the 1991 Survivor Series in a match that was dubbed Hogan’s “Gravest Challenge.” Most fans assumed the champ would somehow find a way to topple his massive challenger, just as he had done to his competition so many times before. But those fans failed to account for Flair. With the referee’s attention diverted, the Nature Boy slipped a chair into the ring. Undertaker then scooped up Hogan and delivered a skull-crushing Tombstone directly on top of the chair. With a look of satisfaction proudly displayed on his face, Flair sauntered back to the locker room as the referee made the three count. Hogan had shockingly lost the WWE Championship to Undertaker, thanks in large part to the interference of Ric Flair.
The impact of the Tombstone resulted in a several-day hospital stay for the Hulkster. His team of doctors advised him to have surgery to fuse together the disks in his neck. Hogan, however, wanted none of that. Surgery would require a lengthy stay on the sidelines, which meant he would not be able to seek revenge from Undertaker. So despite having little feeling in his arms, Hogan checked out of the hospital and prepared for his rematch.
Immediately following the “Gravest Challenge,” backstage interviewer Gene Okerlund tracked down WWE President Jack Tunney to demand the controversial situation be cleared.
“The referee’s decision is final and cannot be challenged by me,” said Tunney, while a visibly angered Okerlund fought to maintain his composure. “However, it is well within my authority to order a rematch at the earliest possible date. Therefore, it is my decision that Undertaker meet Hulk Hogan in a rematch for the [WWE] title this Tuesday in Texas [December 3, 1991, on Pay-Per-View]. And furthermore, I will physically be at ringside to ensure a fair and just outcome.”
Tunney’s announcement of a rematch shook the wrestling world to its foundation. Never before had WWE produced two Pay-Per-View events within one week of each other. The controversy surrounding Undertaker’s win, however, deemed it necessary. The event was appropriately called This Tuesday in Texas, and it was Hulk Hogan’s chance to right the wrong done by Ric Flair.
Like Survivor Series, the rematch was marred by the Nature Boy’s meddling. But before a repeat performance could completely unfold, Hogan managed to neutralize Flair with a steel chair to the back. The force of the blow caused the Nature Boy to fall forward, directly on top of Tunney.
With the WWE President out cold at ringside, Hogan was able to wrest Undertaker manager Paul Bearer’s mystical urn away. He popped off the top and poured some poor soul’s ashes onto the ring mat. He then grabbed a handful of ashes and tossed them directly into Undertaker’s eyes, temporarily blinding the champ long enough for Hogan to roll him up for the win.
A mere six days after losing to Undertaker at Survivor Series, Hogan defeated the Deadman at This Tuesday in Texas to claim his unprecedented fourth WWE Championship.
The celebration, however, did not last long.
The route Hulk Hogan took to regain the gold was highly controversial, and as a result, the status of his reign was in great question. The following weekend, Tunney appeared on WWE television via satellite from his office at the company’s headquarters: “As president of World Wrestling Federation, I am fully aware that the decisions of this office are not always popular, and that this one will be no exception. However, I cannot stand idly by and take little action in the face of such grievous circumstances. This past Tuesday in Texas, during the Undertaker–Hulk Hogan Championship Match, I witnessed with my own eyes what I believe was a flagrant and far-reaching oversight on the part of the referee. Now, the referee’s decision is final. I will not challenge his official decision. However, under these circumstances, I have little choice but to decree the [WWE] title vacant.”
Tunney scheduled the vacancy to be filled at the following month’s Royal Rumble, where the winner of the thirty-man, over-the-top-rope Rumble Match would be declared the new champion. With so much at stake, the event was easily the most anticipated Royal Rumble in the five-year history of the event. All the big names took part, including Sid Justice, Randy Savage, Roddy Piper, Ted DiBiase, a young Shawn Michaels, and Ric Flair. The two most recent WWE Champions, Undertaker and Hogan, would also compete in the match. Recognizing their recent history with the title, Tunney gave them a slight edge over the competition by ensuring their draw would be no lower than twenty.
The late draw failed to help Undertaker, who was eliminated by Hogan after approximately fourteen minutes of action. The Hulkster, on the other hand, looked primed to take the prize after entering in the twenty-sixth spot. But Sid Justice had other plans. The chiseled Superstar snuck behind the unsuspecting Hogan and dumped him over the top rope, thus crushing his hopes of becoming a five-time WWE Champion. Irate, Hogan screamed at Justice from the floor before grabbing his hand and trying to pull him over the top rope. While this was going on, Ric Flair quickly slipped behind Justice and tossed him over the top to win the Rumble Match and fill the six-week-long WWE Championship vacancy.
Undertaker clotheslines Hulk Hogan.
Bobby Heenan and Ric Flair.
Ric Flair’s victory shocked everybody in attendance. Of course, they recognized that he was one of the greatest to ever compete, but he had entered the Rumble with the third draw, meaning he was in the ring battling for a full grueling hour. Prior to Flair’s victory, the longest a Rumble winner had ever competed was Hogan’s twenty-minute appearance in 1991.
After the Rumble Match, Flair made his way to the locker-room area, where Tunney formally presented him with the WWE Championship. With a tear in his eye, Ric Flair proclaimed that winning the title was the greatest moment of his life. Nearly two decades later, the Nature Boy still feels the same way.
“That was the biggest moment of my career, which is saying a lot. It meant so much to regain that championship status, especially since I was representing WWE, which was a much bigger company than where I had been. It was a huge night. I was completely overwhelmed.”