My guess: Hogan stays in AWA, but Verne keeps honeydicking the AWA title and fans continue to leave. In a late, desperate attempt, Verne finally puts the belt on Hogan but way after anyone gives a fuck. The territory dies, Hogan goes to Vince or JCP and becomes a midcarder and a footnote in history.
Verne Gagne, along with being old school about wrestling and promotion, did not see the value in merchandising. Hogan has overblown over the years how much influence he had in inventing wrestling merch (for example, claiming that WWWF didn't have magazine and shirt sales until he showed up) but at the end of the day, AWA was terrible at merchandising and modern advertising. Hulk was the Nikola Tesla of merchandizing compared to Verne.
On top of no real investment into merchandising, Verne expected pretty much all merch sales go to him. It literally encouraged talent to not work that side of the business.
Also, keep in mind, Verne Gagne never had signed contracts with talent. It was all handshakes which is a retarded way of doing any sort of business. And like Cornette mention, Hogan was smart to learn from other wrestlers.
Looking back, it's amazing AWA lasted as long as it did. Just to give a taste of what Verne had and he let slip away, Hulk v Brockwinkle. Verne would do three of these matches where Hulk would win and then they would overturn it for a rule violation.
You got Hogan, Nick Brockwinkle, Bobby the Brain in the corner. Mean Jean Okerland is the ring announcer. The pop for Hulk is crazy.
Verne thought this couldn't print him money.
That's cool hope it does well for him. Like Sabu, I think Raven really doesn't get his due because his best stuff was in ECW but before they got PPV/TNN. And even if you weren't a fan of his wrestling he has some of the most entertaining shoot interviews of all time especially the Sandman series.
It's because he is responsible for Disco Inferno.
