For Rams’ Newman, It’s Difficult to Watch : Pro football: Free safety tries to take his mind off team’s struggles by switching channels.

The Rams have lost four of their last six games by a combined 16 points, and free safety Anthony Newman is taking the frustration of the close losses home with him after games.

Newman, a defensive captain, turned his back to the field when the offense was playing last season because he couldn’t bear to watch.

But Sunday night, Newman couldn’t even watch the game highlights on television after the Rams’ 20-17 loss to the Raiders at Anaheim Stadium.

Not with highlights--or lowlights--such as these:

--Tailback Jerome Bettis getting buried by the Raider defensive line, gaining a career-low 13 yards in 10 carries.

--Starting quarterback Chris Chandler suffering a sprained left ankle in the second quarter when Raider defensive tackle Chester McGlockton busted through the Rams’ revolving-door offensive line and sacked him.

“I have to turn it off and watch some cartoon or something,” Newman said. “I watched ‘Fantasia’ last night.

“I have to get my mind off it because when you start thinking, ‘Oh, we lost by three points,’ you will drive yourself . . . It’s different if you’re getting beat by 30 or 40 points. But we’ve lost three games where it could have gone either way.”

Three-point losses to the Raiders, New Orleans Saints and Atlanta Falcons leave the Rams 4-6 and with fading playoff hopes entering Sunday’s showdown against NFC West rival San Francisco at Candlestick Park.

Will Bettis get shut down again? Will Chandler even be able to play? Will the struggling offensive line--playing without injured starters Jackie Slater, Bern Brostek and Leo Goeas--be able to protect Chandler or his backup, Chris Miller?

Bettis, who set a goal of 2,000 rushing yards this season, failed to gain 100 yards for the fifth consecutive game and is quickly losing ground in the NFL rushing race. He is sixth in the league in rushing with 827 yards in 243 carries, a 3.4-yard average, and trails league-leader Barry Sanders of the Detroit Lions by 492 yards.

“It’s rough,” Bettis said. “There’s not a whole lot of positives. We got beat up front, and that’s the bottom line. We couldn’t find anywhere to run, so we had to abort the running game.

“It’s frustrating, considering that our game plan is built around running and then we can’t run the ball in a critical game.”

The Raiders were set on stuffing Bettis, but Chandler exposed the soft underbelly of the strategy by throwing deep to Flipper Anderson in the first quarter, including a 22-yard touchdown pass.

“When they sell out and bring everyone up to stop Jerome, you’ll get some sizable yardage throwing downfield,” Chandler said. “They wanted to stop the run, but shoot, we’ll throw for 100 yards a quarter.

“Maybe we need to throw more to open it up for Jerome.”

Chandler was doing that.

He completed 10 of 11 passes for 171 yards and a touchdown before suffering the injury.