This one time, this Bears game is personal

Thanks, gentlemen, for the opportunity to address you before today's NFC championship game against the rival Green Bay Packers.

Trust me, this is the highest honor for someone who grew up in Chicago as a big Bears fan and who later became a harsh critic as a sports writer.

(Hey, who threw that shoe? Was that you, Urlacher? Cutler? Please, I'm here to provide inspiration, not get peppered. Was that you, Peppers?)

Anyway, as a journalist I'm partial to nonpartisanship. Today, though, is the exception. Today it's personal.

No offense, but you guys think you know what this game is all about and in reality you don't know squat.

Most of you are just passing through town on the way to retirement in gated golf communities somewhere warm.

Most of us are here for the rest of our lives, left to deal with frigid winters and those snots up in Wisconsin.

So allow me to educate you on the essence of the rivalry. For the record I'm predicting Bears 20, Packers 19, not exactly a landslide vote, but any victory over Green Bay by any margin is decisive. In the playoffs it's monumental.

Sometimes it's more difficult to tell whether Chicagoans are happier when the Bears qualify for the Super Bowl or when the Packers are eliminated from contention.

For both to occur on the same day, well, that would be heaven. For the opposite to occur on the same day, well, that would be hell.

Some of you players and coaches say you don't like the Packers. Please understand that no way could you dislike them as much as Bears fans dislike them.

Today isn't just about you going to the Super Bowl. It's more about Bears fans whose self-esteem requires beating Green Bay.

For them this is an opportunity to avenge atrocities like Mark freaking Lee riding Walter Payton over a bench, Ken freaking Stills cheap-shotting Matt Suhey and Charles freaking Martin body-slamming Jim McMahon.

Any Bears-Packers game is a test of manhood. This one will be to the extreme. Win it and the hair on your chest will stand up; lose it and the lace on your doilies will lie down.

Men, people doubted the Bears all season, and Vegas still favors the Packers. You're a reflection of us and vice versa, so if you're doubted as a team we're doubted as a people.

So go out and win this game for yourselves, but foremost for the guy dressed in orange and blue doing lube jobs in Aurora … for the teacher in Palatine who baked her kids cookies sprinkled with “Go Bears!” … for the plumber in Mundelein with Da Coach's face tattooed on his, uh, lower back.

Win it for all Bears fans still resenting that the Super Bowl trophy is named for Lombardi instead of Halas.

You heard by now that this rivalry was played in the postseason only once before, in 1941, the Sunday following Pearl Harbor.

The next time the Bears face the Packers in the playoffs might be 2081, perhaps the Sunday following Armageddon.

Do the math: Today is worth 70 years of bragging rights.

So beat the Packers for Papa Bear, Sweetness and all others who lived for this particular day but died before it arrived.

Thank you for your time and attention and have a great game … go-go-go, fight-fight-fight, win-win-win …

Now let's get this over with so I can get back to being a sarcastic, cynical, critical sports writer.

(Hey, who threw that jock strap up here? Devin? Lance? Was that you, Olin?)

mimrem@dailyherald.com