5 Things That Could Change Professional Wrestling Over The Next 12 Months

#5 The return of Hulk Hogan

Hulk Hogan and Triple H at the premiere Of HBO's "Andre the Giant" documentary

It has been almost 3 years since Hulk Hogan was fired by WWE as a result of his infamous remarks on what was intended to be a private recording. Immediately the company changed directions to minimize the importance of Hogan within the overall legacy of WWE, comparable to what it did during Hogan's tenure with TNA Wrestling.

WWE's backlash against Hogan was so strong that the company even put the kibosh on a Mega Powers tribute tag team that it then had going on with Damien Sandow and Curtis Axel.

Within months of Hogan's departure from WWE there were already rumors of his return. These rumors have never gone away. Several times since then something historic that was related to Hogan -- like HBO's recent documentary on Andre the Giant -- has come up and WWE has put out a denial about Hogan returning to the company.

Regardless of how you feel about Hulk Hogan the person, Hulk Hogan the wrestler helped make wrestling a big deal. WWE stands to gain a lot from employing Hogan, even if he has more apologizing to do in the eyes of today's overly-politically-correct society. His name still means a lot to millions of people. In turn, his name would sell tickets to live events and plenty of new merchandise.

The return of Hogan to WWE's ranks would mean a lot of things. First, it would show the ability to do business with people it did not see eye to eye with, which arguably the company did in recent years with Goldberg, The Ultimate Warrior and the estate of "Macho Man" Randy Savage.

Second, it would show that the company is not overly concerned with political correctness since wrestling really does involve bullying and xenophobia within its storytelling. Also of importance is that Hogan's return would show to be following through with its "then, now, forever" mantra by further bridging the gap in its current timeline.