EARTH CITY, Mo. — Things started out strikingly well for St. Louis Rams quarterback Austin Davis after he took over for Shaun Hill at halftime of the season opener.

In his first three starts, the Rams defeated Tampa Bay when Davis led the team to a game-winning field-goal drive. In the next two games, the Rams lost to Dallas and Philadelphia, but scored 59 points and gained 448 and 466 yards.

Since then, Davis has faced the reality of the NFL when going against good defenses. In the next five games, the offense’s high-water mark was 309 yards in a Monday night loss to San Francisco. Following that game, the total yards have been 272 against Seattle, 200 against Kansas City, 193 against the 49ers and 244 in Sunday’s 31-17 loss to Arizona. The average yards per play in the last three games has been 3.9, 3.7 and 4.2.

The loss of wide receiver Brian Quick for the season has been a factor, but Davis has struggled against the pass rush and has made mistakes that have either prevented key plays from happening or had turnovers result in touchdowns for the opponent.

Sunday, there was an interception return and sack/fumble return for scores in the fourth quarter that saw a 17-14 Cardinals lead become a 31-17 deficit. Prior to the first pick-six, Davis badly underthrew wide receiver Chris Givens for what might have been a touchdown, but instead it was another interception.

The Rams lead the NFL with eight return touchdowns against, while the team with the next most, Jacksonville, has just five. No other team in the league has more than three. Davis has accounted for six of the eight with four interceptions and two sack/fumbles. The other two were on special teams. All of the return scores have been in the team’s six losses, with at least one in each game. Most unfortunate is that all four of the interceptions and one sack/fumble have occurred in the fourth quarter.

Overall, six of Davis’ nine interceptions have come in the final quarter.

Said Davis, “I didn’t play well enough to win today. I think the thing I’m learning really quick is you can play well for three and a half quarters but you’ve got to play four. You can’t have a single letdown and right now I’m having those and it’s costing our football team. I’ve got to stay the course, stay strong and keep getting better and eliminate these mistakes, mainly turnovers,that are costing our football team.”

The play to Givens isn’t the first time Davis has underthrown a receiver while throwing when rolling out. Davis said, “I don’t really have an answer for it. I don’t understand it. We got the look we were looking for, I thought Chris ran a good route and won. The ball didn’t go where I wanted it to.”

While there are those who believe this would be a good time to give Hill a chance and let Davis watch from the sideline, head coach Jeff Fisher said there are no plans for that to happen. Asked whether he considered making a change, Fisher pointedly said, “No. (He) didn’t have his best half. He missed some opportunities. He made a couple bad decisions and he had trouble seeing at times. The last couple of weeks, he’s thrown four interceptions, but we’re going to hang in there. He’s working real hard, so we’ll see where it goes.”

Not surprisingly, Fisher gave added support to Davis when asked if he thought Davis was becoming frustrated. “The position’s hard to play,” Fisher said. “This defense has done this to a lot of quarterbacks, good quarterbacks. He’s disappointed, but that’s part of playing the position. Sometimes you’re going to have a hard Sunday as a quarterback. He’s disappointed in what happened, but he’ll bounce back.”

Not surprisingly, the inexperienced Davis is far from mastering the ability to slide away from the pass rush, or at least stay focused on his receivers instead of looking at the rushers. Even he acknowledged that Sunday after the Cardinals sacked him six times.

Asked about handling Arizona’s blitzes, Davis said, “It’s hard. I think the thing you have to do is just kind of let it all play itself out. They’re putting guys everywhere and bringing them from everywhere. So, just the ability to learn from this and get your eyes downfield and not on the rush is something that I’ve got to do.”

Davis now has a fourth-quarter passer rating of 68.1, and the Rams have been outscored in their six losses 55-10 in the third quarter and 70-30 in the fourth quarter. Discounting the Philadelphia game, in which the Rams outscored the Eagles 14-0 in the final quarter, the fourth-quarter total would be 70-16.

“It can’t happen,” Davis said of the persistent defensive scores. “It’s killing our defense. They’re playing their tails off. For me to have those letdowns, it’s really tough. I’ve got to get a lot better and I can’t do that.”

REPORT CARD VS. CARDINALS

PASSING OFFENSE: D — QB Austin Davis was solid and efficient in the first half, completing 8-of-10 passes for 110 yards, including a 59-yard touchdown to TE Jared Cook. His passer rating was 145.8. However, in the second half, he was just 9-for-20 for 106 yards with two interceptions, one of which was returned for a touchdown. That lowered his game passer rating to 62.6. It wasn’t all his fault, but he wasn’t able to hit big plays when needed and couldn’t avoid being sacked six times, four of which came in the final two quarters. In fairness, two occurred in the final two minutes with the score 31-14.

RUSHING OFFENSE: D — RB Tre Mason did have a 16-yard run, but his other 13 attempts totaled just 32 yards. Benny Cunningham had four rushes for 12 yards and a touchdown. Zac Stacy was again not part of the offense. Stacy, who did not play the week before, had no offensive snaps Sunday, but was on the field for six special teams plays.

PASS DEFENSE: C-minus — The Rams added another three sacks to their now-growing total and while Cardinals starter Carson Palmer completed 25 of 36 passes, he had only 241 yards and a passer rating of 76.3. Palmer made a big play, running down LB Alec Ogletree after an interception in Rams territory. The Rams, leading 14-10, appeared in good position after Palmer left the game because of a knee injury on a third-down sack with 11:40 remaining. However, backup Drew Stanton took over at the Arizona 11-yard line, and promptly completed three passes for 85 yards, including a 48-yard touchdown to WR John Brown on a blown coverage. That gave the Cardinals their first lead, one they didn’t relinquish.

RUSH DEFENSE: A — The Rams allowed RB Andre Ellington to run for just 23 yards on 18 attempts, and gave up 28 yards on 22 rushes for the game. They have not allowed a running back to reach 100 yards since Dallas’ Demarco Murray had 24 carries for 100 yards in Week 3. Since then, the opposing starting running back in the next six games has totaled 317 yards on 103 attempts, an average of 3.1 yards per rush.

SPECIAL TEAMS: B — Both ways, special teams weren’t much of a factor. P Johnny Hekker had an OK net of 39.6 and was hurt by a punt that barely bounced into the end zone. Arizona punt returner Ted Ginn had three fair catches and one return for 8 yards. K Greg Zuerlin had no field-goal attempts. Benny Cunningham had 63 yards on two kickoff returns, while Tavon Austin had four fair catches and two returns for four yards.

COACHING: B — The game plan did what it was supposed to, getting the Rams to the fourth quarter with a lead and the chance to win.