Role Reversal: 49ers Need a Victory Over Rams to Stay Afloat

Unbeaten? Right. Unappreciated? Apparently. Untested? So it seems.

“We came into the season believing we had to beat the 49ers to win the division,” Ram Coach John Robinson said. “That hasn’t changed.”

Not even when his team is 7-0 and the 49ers are 3-4?

“We’re only assured of (finishing) 7 and 9,” Robinson said.

Everybody wants to beat the Super Bowl champions, but this is getting ridiculous. As people waited for them to explode, they lost three of their last four games.

The time bomb from San Francisco will be passed along to the Rams at Anaheim today, and they realize that their perfect record could blow up in their faces. They see the 49ers fumbling to light the fuse.

“They’re the ones with the Super Bowl rings,” Robinson said. “That’s the same team that beat us twice last year.”

Seekers of truth around the National Football League have been unable to determine how the 49ers have been so bad with the same players, and how the Rams, despite a dynamite defense, have been so good without an offense. The passing game is last in the league, and Eric Dickerson is averaging 74.8 yards a game.

The 49ers’ offense ranks eighth, but closer examination shows that their personality has changed. They are fourth in rushing and 16th in passing.

Coach Bill Walsh said recently: “When you develop a strong running game, generally what goes with it is a deep passing game. The one element that has not been there this year is what we built this team on: the short pass, the continuous first downs.

“Right now, we are caught in a philosophical bind of running well and consequently looking for a big play downfield between runs.”

As a result, Walsh said, his offense has been “very spotty. Utterly spotty. Shockingly spotty.”

The book on the 49ers now is to force quarterback Joe Montana to throw deep by playing close man-to-man coverage in the short-to-medium range, rather than allowing him to pick a defense apart.

Ram cornerback Gary Green said: “Most of their passes are timing passes. Joe Montana drops back five yards and he’s ready to unload. If we can jam his receivers, get ‘em off stride, maybe we can make Joe hold the ball a little longer.”

Holding the ball longer means that Montana is more vulnerable to being sacked or throwing an interception. He has been sacked an average of three times a game, about twice as often as last season. The Rams, with 18 interceptions, share the league lead with Dallas, but they haven’t picked off one of Montana’s passes in four games, since 1982.

Montana said: “I’m not used to standing in there, holding the ball, if I don’t like what’s down the field. It’s been a problem for me. We’ve been trying some new things down the field, and I’m not sure we’re ready for that.”

A lineup change today will have veteran Freddie Solomon at flanker instead of rookie Jerry Rice, the 49ers’ top draft choice. Rice has been benched with a dread disease among receivers, stone hands.

Montana said: “It’ll be another veteran back in there, used to the system, and we don’t have to be worrying about adjustments and whether he has run the play before. Jerry had a chance at it, and he’s gonna be a great one. He just needed a little more time.”

Fritz Shurmur, the Rams’ defensive coordinator, doesn’t buy any of the 49ers’ sob story.

“Somebody might be lulled into saying they’re a different offensive team because of their record, but I don’t see it,” Shurmur said. “This is the best offensive team we’ve played.

“They’re scoring one-tenth of a point less and (gaining) 20 yards less a game at this point. That’s one 20-yard play out of 70 in a game. I don’t see anything different from last year. (There’s) nobody like them. A ton of play-action passes. A great degree of unpredictability.”

The Rams would like to be playing offense as well as the 49ers, but they will be disinclined to flex Dieter Brock’s biceps as long as their defense is keeping games under control. The Rams have been behind in only three of their games and never by more than seven points.

Robinson said: “We have to play within ourselves. We’re trying each week to improve.”

He joked that the Rams have been keeping the offense under wraps: “We’ve timed it well. We’ve kept it (the offense) from becoming too hot until now.”

Ram Notes The Ram defense, ranked second behind the Giants, has allowed no touchdowns in the first quarter and has allowed a league-low total of 89 points. The 49ers have scored only seven points in the second half over the last two weeks. . . . The Rams are plus-14 in turnovers this season, the 49ers minus-4. . . . Injured 49ers in question today include All-Pro guard Randy Cross and outside linebacker Todd Shell. Michael Carter, just off injured reserve, will start at nose tackle in place of Manu Tuiasosopo.