Bret goes into wrestlemania 9 (1993) as the defending champ against Yokozuna, who won the rumble to get the shot at the belt. At the end of the match Mr Fuji throws salt in Bret’s face while he’s got the sharpshooter locked in and Yokozuna covers for the win. While Bret is standing ringside basically trying to wipe his face off, hulk hogan shows up to talk to Bret. All of a sudden Mr Fuji gets on the mic and challenges hogan to face Yokozuna for the belt on the spot. Hogan rushes into the ring, the match starts, and after about a minute or two Yokozuna sets hogan up for Fuji to throw salt in his face. Hogan ducks, Yokozuna gets salt in the face, hogan hits the leg drop, covers Yokozuna for the 3 and the title, and the show goes off the air with hogan posing for the camera as the new champ. Totally pulled the rug out from under Bret who’d just won it all for the first time in October 1992 after 16-17 years in the ring himself. Hogan was 39 at this point and his high point of his match with Andre the giant was 6 years ago at this point and it had been 9 years since hogan won it for the first time. He’d lose the belt to Yokozuna at king of the ring a few months later and left for wcw later that year. Bret didn’t fully recover until beating Yokozuna at wrestlemania 10 the following year in Madison square garden. Bret doesn’t think very highly of hogan and this is one of many reasons why.
