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Rob Van Dam on Hulk Hogan getting booed at WWE RAW’s Netflix debut: “I don’t see how it’s that big of a deal”

Aaron Rift

At the Netflix premiere of WWE RAW on January 6th 2025, Hall of Famer Hulk Hogan cut a promo with longtime manager Jimmy Hart to hype up the event and promote his Real American Beer product. Despite praising the fans, Hogan was largely booed during the segment.

While speaking on his podcast, WWE Hall of Famer Rob Van Dam commented on the segment…

“I did see video of Hulk Hogan’s part of the show on every single website and news platform that there is online. Everybody picked that up, and they still are. Why is that such big news? ‘Pro Wrestler is booed at a wrestling event.’ I understand why it’s so hot. I mean, Hogan, he’s controversial and quite possibly the most recognizable celebrity on the planet, so I get where that’s hot, but they light him up, and they let him cool down, light him up, lights himself up, he cools down. He goes through cycles always and always seems to dig himself back out mostly and then bury himself again.

This one, I’m trying to figure out why is everybody so into this moment that Hulk Hogan got booed. I think maybe one factor that I suspect, but I don’t know, everybody wants want to fake-ify wrestling so much. People don’t like to feel like they don’t understand something, but they want to believe that they do have an understanding of how everything works. I think that people, maybe one of the reasons that it’s such a big topic is because people are thinking, ‘This wasn’t their plan. WWE didn’t want people to boo him. Hulk didn’t want people to boo him. He was supposed to get big cheers, and the people doesn’t like him, so they booed him.’ I think maybe that’s part of the interest is they’re trying to fake-ify and set up instead of just going with the roll. Roll with it, and hey, guess that? That happened. Any other promo, Hulk would have just turned with them. ‘We gotta change some things, brother.’ I don’t see how it’s that big of a deal. I’m confused by it a little bit.” (quote courtesy of Colin Tessier)