2011 Championship: Bed of Roses

The biggest upset of the century has occurred! A wild card team has toppled the mighty Sour Snails, and mostly in uncontested fashion. The Amoebas handily took PTS, REB, STL, and FG%, and secured 3PT and BLK by enough to insure a victory by mid day Sunday. The parade route was already getting lined up and all of Michigan was gearing up for a celebration. Rumors had it that Owner/GM/Coach Eric-A fainted for a few moments as he realized that the victory was imminent. And it's been revealed by sources close to Eric that he's never won a fantasy championship in thirteen years of play, since 1998, so this is even more special of an accomplishment!

As for the dethroned defending champs, the Sour Snails were fighting injuries all post-season and their wagon fell entirely apart by the end. With basically all of their top guys injured or straight out missing games -- Kevin Love, Stephen Jackson, Danilo Gallinari, Stephen Curry, and eventually Josh Smith -- Trieu put up a valiant fight but really didn't have the horses for this matchup. This was like Lakers - Pistons in the 1980's when a few key injuries determined the winner. Although maybe a full roster wouldn't have helped the Snails against the power of an one celled organism.

Looking a little closer at the performance, we have to give the MVP to point guard Derrick Rose, who was simply outstanding all season long, and especially these last few weeks. He put up 25.0 PTS, 5.0 AST, 1.5 3PT, and stellar percentages for championship week. His young backcourt mate, Eric Gordon, chipped in ten steals even as his shooting was a bit off. The other key to winning the crucial steals battle was big men Andray Blatche and Paul Millsap combining for fourteen steals this week. Fourteen! Looking over the stat sheet, this was a huge team effort as everyone player contributed a steal, seven recorded at least a block, and four players were in double digit assists.

The Amoebas were 3-15 in 2010 and were being compared to door mats coming into the season. There was room for lots of growth but nobody expected the season they eventually had. After stumbling out of the gate with three straight losses, Eric-A's team managed a five game winning streak mid-season to show signs of righting the ship. However, another three game losing streak had them mainly treading water and they slipped into the playoffs with only nine wins (against ten losses). The Amoebas were first or close to first in PTS, 3PT, and STL, but were below average in most of the other areas. They were also dead last in TO for the season. Proving that activity isn't always the key to success, GM Eric-A used only six roster moves all season long.

However, they had a solid eight man rotation all season long, with Rose, Ellis, Millsap, Cousins, Gordon, Michael Beasley, Andray Blatche, and Channing Frye doing most of the in-season damage. Ty Lawson and George Hill came in off the bench for a key games (as did Ersan Ilyasova and Anthony Morrow) and made the most of their minutes. Rose averaged 25.1 PTS, 7.8 AST, 4.1 REB, 1.6 3PT, and 1.1 STL for the season. Monta Ellis played one more game than Rose and averaged 24.1 PTS, 5.6 AST, 1.7 3PT, and 2.1 STL. Shooting guard Eric Gordon only played in a little more than half the games but he added additional scoring and outside shooting.

The real post-season star was Andray Blatche, who notched 23.9 PTS, 11.6 REB, 2.4 STL and almost a block per game over his last month of games. Add in similar numbers by Millsap and rookie DeMarcus Cousins (around 15 PTS, 8 REB, 2.5 AST, 1 STL/BLK for both) and this quickly became the team to beat. Their post-season run included victories over an eleven win team, a fifteen win team, and finally a fourteen win team.

Going forward, we have to say that the Amoebas are set up for a fierce title defense. As the youngest team in the league, they have definitely won a championship ahead of schedule and have a beautiful core to continue their winning ways. Congrats to Eric-A and the Amoebas for a fantastic finish to an exciting season!