It's fair to say that last year's triumphant 22-20 win over the Bears marked a moment where many of us believed the Falcons were for real and were going places. One of the most coronary-inducing games I've seen in my entire lifetime, the Bears game was an immense victory for us and will serve as a fond memory for as long as I live. In short, a great thing for Falcons fans.
But imagine, for a moment, that you are a Bears fan. Imagine the pain of losing that game, a game you probably felt reasonably confident you were going to win, by such a close margin in the very final seconds. If the tables had been turned, there would have been a lot of disgruntled Falcon fans mumbling their way through the day afterwards. That's just the nature of things.
This year, the Bears bring a shiny new quarterback to the Georgia Dome and attempt to enact some revenge. The team is down one Brian Urlacher, their well-known defensive anchor, but still have a strong front seven and will be pushing hard at the line of scrimmage. They'll also look to shred our secondary with Jay Cutler and an athletic receiving corps. Because I value the health of the ol' ticker, I would hope the Falcons would play as aggressively as possible against a middling Bears secondary. I want to put this game out of reach as quickly as possible, and gosh darn it, I really believe the Falcons can do it.
I also just don't want to be on the other end of that 22-20.