2015 Best Detroit Lions Name Tournament: The Championship

The time has finally come. This long, arduous journey has nearly come to its close. Throughout the past three weeks, this grueling tournament has created a rift among Pride Of Detroit. Brothers have become enemies, enemies have become villains and villains have become anti-Gods. If I had known this tournament would create such havoc, I would have never introduced it to our treasured land here.

But with the end now in sight, we must draw forward. We must finish what we begun, so that peace can finally return to our broken homes. Once a champion is finally crowned, we can all go home, have ourselves a drink and sleep for weeks, knowing the carnage is finally over and we are safe (until we all thrash each other's throats when the Lions draft a tight end).

And with that peaceful sentiment, let's finish this.

Ezekiel Ansah vs. Golden Tate. Winner is immortalized as the first ever Detroit Lions Name Bracket Champion; loser is left in the scrap heap with such crappy names as Sam Martin and Michael Williams.

Ezekiel Ansah vs. Golden Tate

Before we get into the specifics of this matchup, let us start by looking back at each player's journey here. Ansah has barely been challenged in this entire tournament. He has been an unstoppable behemoth and seemed destined to reach the finals.

Round 1: Defeated Travis Swanson: 540-33

Round 2: Defeated Andrew Peacock: 441-54

Round 3: Defeated Riley Reiff: 387-39

Round 4: Defeated Jermelle Cudjo: 369-70

Round 5: Defeated Isa Abdul Quddus: 433-214

There was never a close matchup all tournament. Why was Ansah such a dominant force? Just take a look at some of the comments:

Ansah quickly won over the religious vote with his biblical first name. But when that failed, his supporters resorted to some unethical behaviors, trying to sway voters by pushing his nickname "Ziggy," which is irrelevant in this tournament:

The power of Will Smith proved quite influential, as "Ziggy" cruised to the Final Four. But that's when some detractors started to emerge and fight against the all-powerful Ansah.

But that's when things got nasty. The Ansah-nites returned fire with not-so-veiled threats:

In the end, Ziggy's reign over this tournament was never really in jeopardy. He was destined to be here.

Golden Tate, while a one seed out of the Learn The F****** Rules region, is a bit surprising to see here in the finals. He had to go through some fan favorites in Haloti Ngata and Darius Slay to reach the finals. Here is his journey:

Round 1: Defeated Travis Lewis: 514-6

Round 2: Defeated Tyrunn Walker: 408-38

Round 3: Defeated Emil Igwenagu: 331-89

Round 4: Defeated Haloti Ngata: 263-176

Round 5: Defeated Darius Slay: 346-298

Tate quickly turned heads in this tournament by obliterating Travis Lewis in the most lopsided victory in the entire bracket. From there, however, he has slowly lost momentum in each subsequent matchup. His defeat of Darius Slay in the Final Four was one of the closest games in this tournament.

Golden's deep run was bolstered by an early discovery by yours truly on the origins of the word Tate:

Golden is obviously a brilliant first name, and the last name of Tate sounds like a noun of some sort, maybe shorthand for potato, or something. However, "tate" is not a real word. BUT, the top definition of "tate" on Urban Dictionary is, AND I QUOTE:

the most balllin mutherfucker ever

Your honor, I rest my case.

From there, Tate was unstoppable. The justification for his reign was deemed unnecessary by some:

His name was all the justification you needed. And that turned out to be very true.

However, in his epic Final Four battle with Slay, the pollers were split. Slay vs. Tate? There was no clear winner. The Tate crowd tried to resort to literary references to win the undecided votes:

But the battle remained tight into the depths of the night. Then, Tate caught a stroke of luck when one voter accidentally delivered the death blow to Slay:

Slay was unable to escape the curse and, like many before him, was... slayed by Golden Tate.

But the past is now behind us. The ultimate decision stands before us and you hold all of the power. Ezekiel Ansah or Golden Tate?

Vote, and let's end this damn thing.