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October 9th, 2009 
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Former divisional rivals meet up in a huge game for both NFC contenders at the Atlanta Falcons pay a visit to San Francisco to take on the 49ers with a new addition.
The Falcons (2-1) had the unenviable task of being one of the teams to take an early bye week and even more unenviable was the fact that they had to chew on their first loss at the hands of the New England Patriots on Septmember 27, a 26-10 loss.
That same week, the 49ers (3-1) also had a tough loss when Brett Favre led a last minute drive to win the game for the Minnesota Vikings after the Niners led the game most of the way. Yet San Francisco did not have to chew on that for two weeks like their opponents on Sunday as they took their frustrations out on the St. Louis Rams with a 35-0 victory last week.
During the week, the 49ers finally got the news that they expected to hear in July, that their number one draft pick, wide receiver Michael Crabtree had finally signed a contract and reported to the team after his holdout lasted all of training camp, preseason and a quarter of the regular season.
The 10th overall pick is not expected to contribute much this week—or for awhile for that matter as he will be playing in a new offensive system and is basically at the start of training camp and is effectively ten weeks behind his teammates and unless he is a fast learner will not be up to snuff until Week 14 in early December.
Yet San Francisco 49ers may hope he is a fast learner because their offense needs a lift. Despite their best start since 2002, they rank just 28th in the league in offense.
Atlanta boasted a great offense in their turnaround from 3-13 in 2007 to 11-5 and a playoff spot last year, but their running game has been largely kept in check this season.
Michael Turner, whose arrival last year took the pressure off of then rookie Matt Ryan, was second in the NFL with just a hair under 1700 yards with 17 touchdowns, but has struggled to get going this season, averaging just 75.3 yards per game this season.
Still Ryan has asserted himself without the run game this year, throwing for 648 yards with five touchdowns against just one interception.
The Falcons used to reside in the NFC West and the teams met twice annually from Atlanta’s inception in 1966 until divisional realignment prior to the 2002 season sent the Falcons into the newly created NFC South.
Since then the former rivals have met just twice, with Atlanta winning both times, 21-19 in San Francisco in 2004 and 20-16 in the Georgia Dome in 2007.
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