3 Ups & 4 Downs From WWE Raw (22 December - Results & Review)

2. Same Old Theory

Austin Theory Rey Mysterio
WWE

You can take the hoodie off of Austin Theory, but you can’t take the stink off of him.

WWE is engaged in its latest attempt to reboot Theory as a top-tier player, but they are likely to be hampered by the same issues they’ve faced every other time: he’s just not that good. Sure, Austin is a decent-to-good wrestler with a really good look, but you don’t have to go any further than the show-opening backstage conversation between Theory and Paul Heyman to get your first glimpse at why he’s mired in the muck.

Theory delivered an entirely wooden performance as he told Heyman he wore a hood so everyone felt his actions before they saw his face. He admitted that he got comfortable, got injured, and saw how the Vision didn’t wait around to be handed anything – they took what they wanted, so Austin wanted in.

It was as unconvincing of a performance as you could ever imagine, like feeding lines into an AI simulator from five years ago. But hey, Theory’s stock is in the ring, right?

Fast-forward to a boring main event tag match that lasted 15 minutes and featured some of the most basic and forgettable action you’ll see. Sure, Theory got a clean win over Rey Mysterio, but ask everyone who was the last person to beat John Cena at WrestleMania and most will struggle to remember Mania 39.

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Contributor
Contributor

Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.