On the penultimate weekend of the season, Deportivo Alaves played Getafe on Saturday night while everyone else played on Sunday. Why? Because they could.
In the final two rounds, LaLiga schedules all the games that have anything riding on them at the same time on the same day, an act of competitive integrity designed to ensure that no one with objectives to fulfil or their life on the line has an unfair advantage or disadvantage. Only those with nothing to play for are put on different days. In week 37, that meant Alaves, and that meant a lot. In fact, them playing there, Mendizorroza packed but unnoticed by the rest, was almost the perfect portrait of the perfect season.
Perfect?! Yep, pretty much. Irrelevance might not sound very exciting, but this is massive. Midtable mediocrity? That's not mediocre at all, not here. And the fact that few have talked about Alaves? Well, that's a good thing: a reflection of a lack of drama, just a job very well done. That they could get here safe with weeks to spare is a success. The lack of the epic kind of storylines that occupy everyone -- from managerial changes to desperate fights for survival, from wild swings in form to last-minute flukes, jeopardy or glory in every game -- gave Alaves a kind of anonymity. Justice, though, says that it is time to say their name. El Glorioso, their fans call them.
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They're not alone, either, so here's ESPN's guide to the unsung stars of the season -- some of whom you might not have heard much of, and no one could really blame you for that. It's time to give something back to those getting on with just being very good, a little love to LaLiga's best, pound for pound.
THE CLUB: Alaves
Alaves have Hagi, but not that one (Gheorghe). They have Simeone, but not that one (Diego) either. Instead, these are Ianis and Giuliano, the sons of illustrious footballers. And in Simeone's case, he spent much of the season injured, coming back just in time to help Alaves beat Atletico Madrid, which prompted their coach and his dad, Diego, to admiringly say: "On the pitch, he has no mother or father."
Alaves have the lowest budget in the whole league, their salary limit set at €31.28m, which is 10 times smaller than Atletico's. And 24 times smaller than Real Madrid's. More to the point, it is less than half the size of Granada's and Almeria's, both of whom went down. Alaves didn't, and it was clear pretty early that they weren't going to.
The late loan signing of Samu Omorodion helped, but this was all of them, the work done by Luis GarcÃa and his players hugely impressive. Alaves are top in only one stat this season: penalties conceded. They're third in own goals and handballs committed. Not exactly beneficiaries of luck, then. But they do get a lot of crosses in -- only two teams have more -- and they have competed weekend after weekend. Except that they, more than anyone else, have repeatedly been dumped in the Monday and Friday slots no one wants. Until, as the end was close, they played on Saturday. Because they could, which was a lot more than many others could say.
At the start of the season, Luis Garcia warned his players that unlike last year, when they came up from the second division, they were going to lose a lot of games, a new reality they would have to get used to and know how to manage. They did so superbly. And they won a lot of games too.
THE COACH: Jagoba Arrasate, Osasuna
There's also Luis Garcia, obviously, but, well ... that's covered by Alaves' team award. There's Ruben Baraja, the Valencia manager, who has surprised everyone and who put it neatly: "Don't forget where we came from last year, how hard it was. This time we have achieved our objectives [survival] ahead of time. We would all like Valencia to be in a privileged position; I could want a Ferrari, but if I have to drive a Skoda."
Javier Aguirre, the coach if not the character, possibly deserves a little more attention too ... and then there's Jagoba Arrasate.
When he announced that he was stepping down as Osasuna manager, Arrasate said that he wanted to go at the right moment: he didn't want things to "end badly" -- "I couldn't forgive myself," he insisted. As it turned out, this is a pretty flat end to the season, but that's at least in part because of how he has altered expectations in Pamplona. "We haven't been able to continue what we did last year," he confessed, which said much. Yet Osasuna, who he took over in the second division, took to a Copa del Rey final and a European place, have secured their primera status very early for a fifth season in a row, despite having the fifth-smallest budget in Spain, and he departs with them in a good place, a job well done.
Arrasate also departs having dignified football, one of the most genuine, least presumptuous men in the game. As a coach sometimes you suffer, but sometimes it's worthwhile. "That beer just after a game [you win], when you say 'wow, how good was that?' is the best moment of the week," Arrasate says. Maybe at the end of week 38, the last game of the season and his final match after six superb years at Osasuna, he can have another. After all, Jagoba, you've earned it.
THE SIGNING: Daley Blind, Girona
OK, so Daley Blind isn't unknown, exactly. In fact, one of the measures of just how extraordinary this season has been for Girona is that for much of it they chased a league title when, if you go through their squad, their players had 37 relegations between them and only 14 league titles. And it's a bit of a push to truly include a lot of those titles: three for Eric GarcÃa, two at Manchester City when he played zero and six games, and one at Barcelona after which they decided they didn't want him anymore; one for Pablo Torre at Barcelona; one for Cristhian Stuani at Danubio some 20 years ago; one for Artem Dovbyk at Midtjylland; one for Savinho at Atletico Mineiro when he played only four games.
As for Blind, he alone was responsible for more than half of them: seven at Ajax and one at Bayern. He had also played at Manchester United of course, and got over a hundred caps for the Netherlands.
So, unknown? Nah, but largely overlooked this year? Yep.
Blind came aged 34, having departed United five years earlier, seemingly coming toward the end, and wasn't wanted by Bayern anymore. As Girona flew, few really talked about him. There is a parallel here, by the way, to Girona midfielder Iván MartÃn, who is a candidate for inclusion in this season's best unsung players. Instead, the focus fell on Aleix and Savinho and Dovbyk. Portu had his moment. Stuani has his status, a true superstar. Yan Couto flew. Eric Garcia had that redemptive narrative arc. But without Blind, it doesn't happen. Only four players in the entire league had more touches. And all that for free.
THE PLAYERS
There are plenty who deserve their moment. Diego Rico (on loan at Getafe from Real Sociedad), say. And Mika Mármol at Las Palmas. Or Nemanja Maksimovic, playing all over the place at Getafe. Ante Budimir (Osasuna), certainly -- although it's hard to make a case for top scorers, quite honestly, even quiet ones like him. Or Gorka Guruzeta, and not so much for the goals as his role as the Basque Benzema, making better players of the other forwards at Athletic Club. But here are our three suggestions.
