7 Ups & 3 Downs From WWE Backlash 2023 (Review)

2. This Guy Knocked Off Cena

Austin Theory
WWE.com

Beating John Cena at WrestleMania should signify that you’re a top star, capable of great feats. At the very least, you should be able to win a title match definitively. Otherwise, you’re just a banana peel champion.

But that’s Austin Theory in 2023. He beat Cena at Mania last month, and he defended his United States Championship against Bobby Lashley and Bronson Reed. On paper, if you were to predict how Theory would retain, the smart money would have been on Lashley incapacitating Reed, only for Austin to toss Bobby and “steal” the pin.

And that’s exactly what happened. Theory was a third wheel in a power match between Reed and Lashley, but he was in the right place to toss Bobby after a spear and pin Bronson to retain the title. Even Michael Cole called him a “survivor,” which again isn’t how you should be describing the guy who got a career-defining win just five weeks ago.

Yes, Theory is a heel champion, but if you’re going to continue booking him like a chickensh**, maybe he shouldn’t have beaten a 16-time world champion at Mania.

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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.