Sports are famous for Cinderella playoff runs. Those moments tend to have the underdog win many games and make a dramatic push towards the championship. It would have been fantastic for 4 Penn Plaza to go on their own Cinderella run in their very first season; however, their chance to attend the big dance will have to wait another season.
Of course, fate would pit 4 Penn Plaza against Caldwell-Pope Mobile in the opening round. The managers of both teams are good friends, and if it wasn’t for their nudging, we might not have entered The Bubble this season. Mobile’s 1703.30-1537.70 victory in this year’s playoffs was just revenge for NFL playoffs as our team rolled past their team en route to the championship.
Even though we are no longer playing in the championship bracket, it has been fun playing competitive fantasy basketball all season.
If you are an avid reader of the blog, you will be familiar with our love of the phrase “broken record.” Most weeks, that one phrase could sum up our fantasy teams.
With our playoff lives on the line in a winner take all matchup, we failed to reach our original projections yet again, which cost us our chance to advance. We came in 88.87 points under those lofty projections, which wouldn’t have mattered because Mobile was on pace for 1654.90 and scored an additional 48.40 just for good measure.
Early projections had Mobile winning by just 28.33 points. However, it turned out to be much worse than that at 165.60.
The pundits were right as the matchup started pretty close, with just 26.90 points separating the two teams. Things opened up on Tuesday and Wednesday as Caldwell-Pope Mobile jumped out to a 232.60 point lead after day three. It appeared to be all but over at that point, but a monster night on Thursday gave us our first lead of the matchup (2.60 points) and got us right back into the thick of things.
Our slight lead evaporated on Friday, and that was all she wrote for our chances in the matchup as the deficit returned to triple digits, ultimately finishing at 165.60 points.
Our first playoff matchup averaged 219.67 points a day, while the daily deficit ran around 121.73 points.
If you clicked on this section and were looking for matchup records, Yahoo Sports stop compiling those numbers; however, they continue to roll out team statistics.
In the last three weeks, we were mopping around about not being the top-ranked team regarding rebounds. That all changed in the first round of the playoffs as we leapfrogged the former number one team, who had a bye last week. It is a small victory, but I will take it.
We remain the top team in blocks, second-best in turnovers, and third overall in steals. Our boys still rank in the bottom half of the league in points scored and assists.
The final score of the matchup was too much to overcome with just one player on the bench. Jusuf Nurkic (Portland) was a game-time decision and was the odd man out on a busy April 9th. His 27.20 points had no impact on the matchup, which was pretty lopsided for most of the week.
The first round of the playoff was pretty uneventful for 60% of the league as six teams didn’t take the court.
The top two seeds (3rd and 4th) advanced in the opening round, filling in both the championship and consolation brackets’ gaps, leaving last week’s losers to drop down into the loser bracket.
Team management made two moves this past, with neither of the moves impacting the series as we had hoped.
Our first move involved cutting ties with a New York Knick, Nerlens Noel, to make room for James Johnson (New Orleans), who had a back-to-back in the middle of the week.
Then with some players headed back to the IR, we had an open space and grabbed another Knick Reggie Bullock, who played so poorly during his one game, he was gone the very next morning.
With the matchup slipping out of our hands, we made no attempts to overcome the 150+ point deficit.
Weekly Move Total: 2/5
Season Move Total: 19/50
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