Twice, Price Nearly Was Right on Money : Rams: He feels as if he lost the game to 49ers after two passes to tight end result in key turnovers.

Don’t worry about it, Anthony Newman told Jim Price as they commiserated at midfield late in the fourth quarter.

“Everybody’s human,” Newman said.

“Nobody’s perfect,” Newman said.

“As they say,” Price would say in the locker room a half-hour later, “it’s always more than one guy’s fault when you win or lose a game.”

Price wasn’t buying any of it.

If the Rams’ bid to upset the 49ers at Candlestick Park comprised the entirety of Price’s world Sunday afternoon, Price had the whole world in his hands.

Twice.

And then he dropped it.

Twice.

First came a fourth-quarter pass, over the middle, with the Rams ahead of San Francisco, 17-10. The pass was high, but catchable. Price got his hands on the ball, but that’s all.

The ball was deflected by right outside linebacker Bill Romanowski and intercepted by left inside linebacker Keith DeLong. A 17-17 tie was coming right up.

Next came another pass, over the middle, but deeper, well beyond those trouble-making linebackers.

Price made the play, which grew bigger with every stride--18 yards, 20 yards, 23 yards . . .

And then, strong safety David Whitmore reached in and stripped the ball, sending it bouncing onto the grass, all the way into Whitmore’s arms, for a recovery at the San Francisco 48.

Three plays later and 49er quarterback Steve Young is dragging Robert Bailey into the end zone for the go-ahead touchdown.

The 49ers eventually win, 27-24, on a last-second field goal by Mike Cofer, but don’t try leaving it at that with Price.

“If there was ever a case where one guy lost a game,” Price said, “today was it.”

Price, from Stanford, is known among Rams as a thinking man’s tight end. But no amount of feel-good cliches, however well-intended, could obscure the facts the way he was seeing them.

“If you isolate those two plays,” Price said, “if you take those plays out of the game, there is not any way we could have lost. If I hang on, we win.

“We had the lead, we had the momentum. All I’ve got to do there is hold onto the ball so we keep driving and kick a field goal.

“I’ve got to be smarter than that.”

Smarter?

“When a team is down, they’re going to try to make plays like that,” Price said of Romanoff batting the ball and Whitmore stripping it.

“I really don’t think about fumbling while I’m out there. I don’t often fumble. Before today, I think I only had one (in the NFL). But after this, I’m going to be thinking about not fumbling, especially in that situation. I’m going to be more conscious of it now.”

Experience can be the cruelest teacher, and Ram Coach Chuck Knox offered no sympathy from behind the lecturn.

“Two turnovers hurt us,” Knox said. “I thought we had a chance to win, but we turned the ball over twice and it resulted in 14 points for them.

“Until then, we were playing good football on all three units.”

Newman, the Rams’ fifth-year strong safety, took a different tack when he saw Price hanging his head after the midfield fumble. Newman grabbed Price by the shoulder pads, shook him gently, and told him, “Don’t worry about it. We’re going to stop ‘em here and you’re going to get another chance.”

Newman was half right. The Rams didn’t stop them--but Price did get his second chance.

Jim Everett threw to him on first-and-goal from the nine-yard line, but Price could make no play, getting crunched in front by cornerback Don Griffin and from behind by free safety Dana Hall.

On the next play, Everett went to Flipper Anderson instead, in the back of the end zone, and Anderson made a diving scoring catch.

“I wanted that ball Flipper caught,” Price said, adding, “You can’t cry over spilled milk.”

Or spilled footballs.