By Richard Gardner, Torch specialist

Among the problems with modern-day pro wrestling, the inability to shock and surprise is one of the most glaring. Not so on Monday night. Instead of Monday night's Raw ending with John Cena on the receiving end of a beat down from one of his Fatal Four-way opponents, WWE decided to run with an invasion angle featuring the entire Rookie cast of the first season of NXT.

This was unlike anything seen on WWE television in recent years. The NXT Rookies not only laid waste to both the face (John Cena) and the heels (Straight Edge Society), they also attacked the announcers and destroyed the ringside area in a way that has never been done before.

The most recent comparison is the WCW/ECW invasion of 2001; an angle which Vince McMahon got completely wrong. What had been a dream feud for wrestling fans for a number of years descended into farce in short order. First, the WCW/ECW team was renamed The Alliance, which was a name that had no brand value to wrestling fans. In an attempt to compensate for the lack of big-name stars brought over from WCW, several WWF stars were moved to the other side. Every time this happened, the less the Alliance resembled WCW. Finally, the WCW stars were squashed by their WWF counterparts in a way that extinguished the credibility of the invasion completely.

Time will tell whether the NXT invasion ends up as yet another unsuccessful attempt to recreate the excitement of the original NWO angle, but the group got off to a tremendous start. All of the Rookies were fantastic in their new roles despite their collective lack of experience. How WWE follows up on the angle is of the utmost importance.

If John Cena gets his comeback on Monday night and destroys the NXT group, then this whole angle would have been a colossal waste of time. However, if Wade Barrett's group continues to attack top stars, and possibly disrupts next week's Pay-Per-View main event, then this will be the foundation on which some very exciting television can be built.

WWE should try to maintain the NXT group's status as outsiders. On Monday night, the group made their entrance through the crowd. Subtle touches like that are important to differentiate the Rookies from other WWE stars. Several sneak attacks through the crowd over the next few weeks would help to build the perception that the group of wrestlers are outsiders rather than part of the main roster.

The benefits of putting over the likes of Michael Tarver and Darren Young as top heels may be called into question when it appears they have no real long-term future in the WWE. Maybe it would have been more beneficial to get Evan Bourne or Dolph Ziggler involved in what was an extremely hot angle. Maybe there will be more additions to Barrett's stable in the future.

Nevertheless, the NXT Rookies have been established as a group to be reckoned with. They can cite some of the more humiliating challenges from Season One of NXT as motivation for their backlash against WWE. They could always add to the stable in the future, although this may run the risk of diluting their status as outsiders similar to WWF wrestlers joining the Alliance in 2001.

Monday night's invasion angle has created a sense of excitement and uncertainty that has been missing all too often in wrestling in 2010. Whether this can be sustained over a significant period of time is open to speculation, but give WWE credit for getting people talking after trying something different.

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