Austin Theory Cites Hernia As Reason For WWE Absence, Reveals His Contract Was Coming Up At The Time

Candid comments from Theory.

A masked individual who was assisting The Vision faction first showed up in the men’s WarGames match at Survivor Series. Several weeks later, the masked individual was revealed to be Austin Theory.

Theory had not wrestled since July 2025, and he opened up about his absence and return on The Mark Hoke Show Pro Wrestling Show. Theory said he was dealing with a hernia, and after matches, he would have to pop it back in.

After the July 2025 bout, his hernia would not pop back in, so he ended up going to the emergency room. Theory also revealed that his WWE contract was coming up at the time.

“Everything happens for a reason. But, I was actually wrestling with a hernia for a very long time, and as gross as it is, I was having to pop it back in after certain matches and yeah, just stuff people don’t know about. They don’t know when somebody goes to the ring, you know, what the damage is but, I was in a good spot… and even when it was hitting a low for me, I was doing everything that I could to just stay and keep the wheels turning on the car, and it reached a point, I had a match on Main Event, and it would not go back in. So that night, I went to the emergency room, and it blew my mind because I was like, wow, I just had my gear on, and I went out there and I wrestled and now I’m in the E.R., and now it’s like, well, where does this go from now? Because now I’m out of the picture. My contract was actually coming up so, a lot of things were hitting me personally and that’s kind of one of those things, that’s a low point in your life where you get really rocked, and to me, those points… you either stay down or you pick yourself up and you become a version of yourself that’s always been in you but it takes you to that next level, and it helped me reframe my mindset and everything and coming back, I just knew, this is my value and this is what I need to be doing. So, and as you see, it’s clear vision now.”

Present day, Theory and Logan Paul are the WWE World Tag Team Champions. With an inadvertent assist from IShowSpeed, they defeated The Usos (Jimmy Uso & Jey Uso) for the belts on Monday Night Raw in Madison Square Garden.

If the quote in this article is used, please credit The Mark Hoke Show Pro Wrestling Show with an H/T to Fightful for the transcription.