Miller Earns the Starting Spot : Pro football: Ram quarterback has his best game despite losing to the 49ers, but Jerome Bettis needs some help.

Chris Miller has settled the quarterback pecking order for now, so the Rams can turn their attention to other pressing needs, such as opening some holes for Jerome Bettis and winning a close game.

They haven’t done much of either lately.

The Rams are 4-7 and have lost five of their past seven games by an average of 4.6 points. Bettis, their star tailback who talked bravely before the season about gaining 2,000 yards, might not see 1,000 if his pace continues.

“We’re looking for positives right now,” Ram Coach Chuck Knox said.

Knox might have found one in Miller, who re-established himself as the starter Sunday night by bouncing back from a knee injury to throw for a season-high 228 yards and two touchdowns in the Rams’ 31-27 loss at San Francisco.

Knox, who normally doesn’t make personnel decisions on Mondays, said Miller is “obviously” the starter for Sunday’s game at San Diego while Chris Chandler’s sprained left ankle continues to heal.

“It was important for me to go out there and play well,” Miller said. “It’s always a challenge playing against San Francisco. But it doesn’t matter because we didn’t win.”

A week ago, Knox still was hedging on who his starter would be--Miller, who is still shaking off the effects of a concussion from three weeks earlier; or Chandler, who completed 10 of 11 passes against the Raiders before spraining his ankle.

Miller became the starter by Wednesday, and Chandler was hopeful he would be available as a backup. But after Chandler had worked out for the Rams’ medical staff two hours before kickoff Sunday, it was determined he wasn’t ready. Knox hopes to have him back at practice this week.

With Chandler out, Knox had to summon backup Tommy Maddox after Miller bruised his right knee on the first offensive series when he was tackled by Bryant Young. Maddox, who had not played since Week 4 against Atlanta, completed three of four passes for 55 yards, including a 39-yard pass to Todd Kinchen that set up Tony Zendejas’ 31-yard field goal.

Miller returned for the next offensive series, showed little effects from the knee injury and played his best game since signing a three-year, $9-million deal with the Rams.

“He stayed in the pocket and threw the ball well,” Knox said. “He got hit and came back in there and showed no effects of getting that knee hurt. He made some big throws. He scrambled and got out of trouble.”

While the offensive line did a better job of protecting Miller--he was sacked twice for minus 11 yards--Bettis still can’t find room to run. The 49ers used as many as eight defenders near the line to stop him Sunday.

After gaining only 29 yards in 15 rushes against the 49ers, Bettis has gained only 42 yards in the past two weeks--two yards less than Kinchen’s 44-yard touchdown run on a third-quarter reverse play.

“Our running game isn’t going,” Miller said. “All the yards Jerome is making, he’s getting on his own. He’s taking a pounding, and he’s too good a back not to get rewarded for what he can do.”

Knox points to injuries on the offensive line as the source of the problem.

Bettis is fading fast in the NFL rushing race. He has 856 yards in 258 carries (3.3-yard average) and trails leader Barry Sanders of Detroit by 505 yards.

Last season, Bettis gained 1,429 yards and finished second to Dallas’ Emmitt Smith for the rushing title.

As the Rams continue to pound him into the waiting arms of defenses, is Bettis still the same back he once was?

“Everyone who’s not that involved in what goes on would have to assume that,” Bettis said. “The numbers speak for themselves. I can’t get frustrated; all I can do is go out and keep chucking away at it.”

Said Knox: “Yes, he’s still the same back. I don’t care who it is, we have to give him some cracks to run through.”