6 Ups & 3 Downs From WWE Payback 2023 (Results & Review)

1. In Need Of A Reboot

Austin Theory
WWE.com

There are wrestlers you see on your TV screen who just scream, “Go away for a few months and come back with a fresh start.” Austin Theory has to be one of those superstars.

Theory has been a fixture on WWE programming for a couple years now, but he has yet to really connect. Sure, his in-ring work is technically fine, and he had a decent United States Championship match with Rey Mysterio Saturday night, but he elicited almost no reaction despite battling one of the most popular superstars in WWE history.

This is a guy who beat John Cena at WrestleMania just five months ago and has gained literally nothing from it other than a useless talking point he repeats ad nauseum with no impact.

On a six-match card for Payback, the US title match was easily the most forgettable of the bunch, with Theory being only a couple upgrades above a Create-A-Wrestler character. He desperately needs to take some time away, find himself and come back.

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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.