TheHitMark-SirJoseOle
A Fan Of Wrestling Not Backstage BS
This is a simple answer!! Vince Mcmahon!! Without him, Hogan, or Austin would never have gotten their names!! Back when Wrestlemania started, Vince very well could have given Steamboat the strap and let him have the Hogan type title reign. Austin was fired by WCW through a phone call. Vince gave him a chance and the era of Stone Cold began. But, yes, it was their bodies that were on the line. Hogan was huge in the 80's early 90's for WWF. Austin was huge for WWE. It is a shame that these two didn't headline Mania, but that is fine. But, Austin surpassed Hogan by far!!
I see where you are coming from on a lot of points, but I think that Hogan was meant to happen, it's just that with the fact that Verne Gagne had some problems with pushing Hogan due to his non-traditional background as a pro wrestler (Verne had a hard time getting past the fact that Hogan was not an amateur wrestler) it made things hard for Verne to progress in the business. But at the time Hulkamania started (which was in the AWA and not WWF like so many people are quick to assume), the AWA was consistently doing great business, in fact they were in the place that the WWF eventually became. They were highly popular and have major television deals, it's rumored that a television special with CBS was in the cards before Hulk Hogan returned to the WWF in 1983, and Hogan already knew how to market himself because the Hulkamania shirts started long before Hogan returned to WWF, in his previous stint with the WWF there was no Hulkamania and his heel demeanor did not allow for that.
So I would say Vince definitely gave Hogan that avenue to see his potential but I do argue that Verne Gagne had he been more lenient and faster in his response to Hogan's stardom, we could have seen Hogan's ascension to icon status with the AWA instead.
Again like the OP asked it's all about who's more important to WWE and not just wrestling, with what I said I feel Hogan's more important to wrestling overall, but with how WWE does their business and how they model themselves but Hogan's rightful intention to protect his best interests make it hard for me to pick him as being more important to WWE due to their controlling nature (at least that's how I see them to be).