Been racking my brain all day long today to find a scenario in which the 49ers lose to the Falcons. It's tough. They are 3 1/2 point favorites, a number that will only go up as the week goes along. They're coming off an historic playoff performance against a hated foe and media darling. The team they are playing is this generation's Buffalo Bills. The Falcons are the Packers only not as good. Any way you slice it, the 49ers should handily win this game...which is nerve racking.
You never want to be *that* team. That's the team that loses to the Giants and goes 18-1, or the one who craps the bed at home against the Ravens (that game is on NFLN right now, in the 4th quarter with 2:20 to go. There are still FIFTY MINUTES left in the broadcast slot. Jeebus.). Or the one who watches Gary Anderson miss his only field goal of the year and then loses to Scott Chandler. The team than CANNOT POSSIBLY LOSE THIS GAME almost always loses this game.
The solace comes from the fact that the national media's perplexing vendetta against San Francisco teams is in full force this week. Can you IMAGINE the amount of national jism that would have been spilled if Russell Wilson had the kind of game Kaepernick had this weekend? Not sure why the 49ers are still being held at arm's length, but it's a good thing. The "experts" are still inexplicably picking Atlanta, which is a good thing. I was worried when I saw the Vegas line that things would go overboard and the 49ers would be installed nationally as *that* team, but fortunately it looks like we dodged that bullet. People are reluctant to ever make the 49ers *that* team, because hey-there's always an east coast team we can ignore them for.
That's fine with me. This team never does well when it's *that* team. They lose to the Vikings or Rams when they're *that* team. I don't think they'd ever have a showing like that in the playoffs, but the further they are under the radar, the better.
The 49ers are superior to the Falcons in every way that you can quantify- offense (close, maybe a push), defense (not close), special teams (close), and coaching (not. close.). They should not lose this game. If they lose this game, it will mean there are serious problems that need addressing. It will mean either that somebody got injured, or some aspect of the team dramatically underperformed. They are simply better. That's not a comfortable position to be in. However, thanks to the media's continually leaving this team at arm's length, at least if they lose it won't be because they were *that* team.
