NXT Invasion: Saving Grace Of a Terrible Show

After doing a little research on the IWC and seeing the overall positive reaction to the NXT Invasion angle I must say I was a little surprised. Well Raw was truly horrible last night and the only saving grace of the night was the NXT angle, but to be honest it wasn't that great. It was OK but far from great and that is my opinion.

I am not really going to touch on the overall quality of the Raw product last night because the first 2 1/2 hours are not even worth talking about again. However I must say I was surprised by the NXT angle but not overly impressed. Don't get me wrong I believe that this angle has potential and it did remind me of some of the WWE's glory years, but I want to reserve my excitement knowing that the WWE's creative team has not exactly been in top form in recent years.

I do see this NXT angle as a possible breathe of fresh air, but I do have a few concerns. For one we have all come down on TNA for using repackaged storylines from the 90s, and this NXT angle seems to be similar to the NWO or WCW/ECW invasion angle. The only problem is this invasion has less star power and the central pieces are developing superstars. By developing superstars I mean the whole beatdown of John Cena seemed sloppy to me. It looked like rookies were doing it, and they were. To be truly honest, Batista has given Cena a better beating in recent months and Cena has 'Superman Up' to much worst beatings. I am sorry but repeated clotheslines, a 450, and few moves by Bryan do not make me believe Cena had be carted off. The Big Show threw Cena though a spotlight, so I need a bit more to believe Cena is hurt but I am also not the target audience of the WWE anymore. Especially since Orton, who has a legit injury, received less attention. As a whole; Barrett, Bryan, and to a certain extent Otunga and Gabriel are the only rookies we care about so this invasion just doesn't have the same flavor as passed invasions. What made the WCW/ECW invasion so cool is we got to see RVD, Sabu, Tommy Dreamer, Booker T, and DDP (big stars) invading and competing with the likes of Kurt Angle, The Rock, Stone Cold, and Jericho. We saw dream match ups that we thought we would never see. It was a wrestling fan's wet dream! The NWO angle had a heel Hulk Hogan and two top stars Scott Hall and Kevin Nash taking wrestling to a new surprising place that none of us had every seen. Now we have 'rookies' that for the most part have been getting beat by the pros for weeks "invading" a show that most of them have already appeared on or even hosted.

I think a lot of this excitement comes from the fact that many of the older fans saw Cena get beat down and the fact that the rest of Raw was so horrible. We finally got a little bit of what we wanted. We finally saw Cena 'lose' and not be SuperCena for once, and I must say that is a welcome change.

However the fact that not one superstar came out to help and the whole roster was at Raw hurt the invasion in my eyes. If the rookies would have took out Cena and CM Punk with superstars like R-Truth, Edge, Hardy, and/or Swagger it would have made them look a little more like professional invaders. It would at least made it look like the rest of the roster gave a damn.

Hell Evan Bourne could have came out to help Cena.

I mean Kane is pissed at the world why not let him come out and let the rookies over power him too?

It would have added a little flavor for the rookies to pick off their mentors too. The Cena beatdown was a bit long and sloppy. The rookies needed a few more bodies (not announcers) to punish instead of having 8 not so polished wrestlers 'picking apart' Cena.

Maybe I have been too spoiled, I mean I once saw the NWO "take The Rock out" by running an 18 wheeler into his ambulance, so forgive me if I am not that excited yet.

Now I hope the WWE does not mess this up however. I can see the tie in with the Undertaker and this having the potential to get some new stars off the ground. The reason I am withholding my excitement is because the WWE did come up short on the WCW/ECW invasion angle and that angle had more experienced and more star wrestlers involved. I hope that this is the beginning of something good, perhaps the rookies can recruit some pros that careers have become stale to help them look more credible and help give a boost to a current superstar's dying career.

While I am happy that many IWC fans have a new excitement toward the WWE. Lord knows it has been while. I on the other hand do not feel the same excitement yet. Maybe it is because I have seen this storyline before, maybe because I am just growing tired of wrestling altogether, or maybe because I have been let down by the WWE creatives for far too long. This is just a critic, but I am crossing my fingers that this could be the start to bring back my passion for the WWE. Until that happens I am not going to get too excited just yet.