Knox and Shula Will Play It Again : Pro football: Dolphins, Marino will provide a truer test of L.A. defense.

Chuck Knox and Don Shula, durable NFL dinosaurs lightly approaching their seventh decades, hook up again Sunday for the 16th time in their combined 50 years as coaches in the league.

Shula, 62, and Knox, 60, the two winningest active coaches and the last of those whose careers began before the 1980s, are walking, talking, winning, losing pieces of league history.

But however tightly they are bound by the years they have known and coached against one another, they bring vastly different football teams to Joe Robbie Stadium.

Knox, as he has always seemed to be doing throughout his Super Bowl-less 20-year career, is in the early stages of rebuilding the Rams, thinking of a payoff three or four years down the road and simply trying to stay competitive until then.

Shula, as he has always seemed to be doing throughout his 30-year, six-Super Bowls career, is gunning for the Big Game this year, making slight alterations to an already potent Dolphin team.

“When we see each other at meetings and things, we go back a long ways,” Shula said of his relationship with Knox, whom he has beaten 10 times in 15 games. “We’ve been around and have gotten to know each other pretty well.”

The Dolphins, whose scheduled home and season opener was postponed by Hurricane Andrew, started their season with a victory in Cleveland last Monday night when quarterback Dan Marino marched them to a game-winning touchdown with seven seconds remaining.

The Rams opened with a desultory blowout in Buffalo, then came back with a 14-0 victory over the New England Patriots.

This is the kind of mini-turnaround Shula has seen Knox pull off before, but on a much larger scale.

“That’s Chuck’s history, what he’s capable of doing,” Shula said. “When you play one of his teams, you can always count on a well-prepared team. A team that just hangs in there. You get the feeling he’ll get it done with the Rams, the way he did before.”

But it’s not likely that the Rams can continue their one-week winning combination of a young, active defense and a mistake-free offense against Miami, which is 19-3 in home openers under Shula and vastly more talented than the Patriots.

New England had Hugh Millen playing quarterback with a separated left shoulder and a confused, overwhelmed offensive line. The Rams registered seven sacks, forced four interceptions and recorded their first shutout in four years.

The Dolphins have Marino, who has gone whole seasons without getting sacked seven times and who specializes in victimizing young defenses with his quick release.

His game-winning drive Monday night over the Browns was the 19th fourth-quarter comeback victory of his career.

“I think he’s one of the best quarterbacks ever to play the game,” Knox said of Marino. “He’s done so much in the years that he’s been down there. He’s got the quick arm, very tough to sack and very, very accurate throwing it.”

The Rams are realistic about what they can accomplish defensively against the Dolphins. Their announced plan is to mix formations and try to get as much pressure as they can without opening up the field for Marino.

“It’s a journeyman’s day against Marino,” defensive coordinator George Dyer said. “You’ve got to keep working all day, all day long, just keep coming and keep coming and getting around him.

“Hopefully, he’s got to hold the ball a little longer and you can beat your man and get to it.”

Said Knox, “He’s tough to sack. You’re in between a rock and a hard spot. If you send more people after him, then you’ve got one-on-one coverage out there against their excellent receivers. And he can put the ball right on the money.

“So we’ve got to change some things up. But I don’t think over the years I’ve seen people dog and blitz him and have that bother him. By the same token, I don’t think you can sit back and play zone all of the time. You’ve got to mix it.”

The Rams’ offense, meanwhile, is a little mixed up itself. After getting mauled by Bruce Smith and the Buffalo defense and surrendering four interceptions the first week, the Rams played it close to the vest against New England and scored only after the defense forced turnovers.

Quarterback Jim Everett has completed only 49.1% of his passes, thrown for only 290 yards, and has the lowest quarterback rating among NFC qualifiers--40.8. Marino’s rating is 109.5, and in one game, he threw for 32 more yards than Everett has in two.

Ram Notes

This Shula-Knox matchup pits coaches with a combined 486 victories including playoffs--making it the second-best such matchup in NFL history. On Nov. 22, 1987, Shula, then with 267 victories, and his Dolphins played Dallas and Tom Landry, whose 265 victories made for a total of 532. . . . The last time these teams played was in 1986, in Anaheim, when Dan Marino threw for 403 yards and five touchdowns in a 37-31 overtime victory. . . . Marino and Jim Everett have the two longest starting streaks in the league. Marino will start his 126th game in a row today, Everett his 67th. . . . The Rams signed defensive tackle Eric Hayes. a former Seattle Seahawk who was waived in the exhibition season. Hayes is expected to play today because of a knee injury suffered by David Rocker, a probable cadidate for the injured-reserve list.