EARTH CITY, Mo. — Five weeks ago, St. Louis Rams quarterback Austin Davis was sitting on top of the world. He had been named the team’s starting quarterback for the rest of the season by head coach Jeff Fisher after playing well in a win over Tampa Bay and losses to Dallas and Philadelphia.

Even retired quarterback Brett Favre, whose records Davis broke at Southern Mississippi, chimed in, saying Davis reminded him of players like Kurt Warner that shined when they finally got their chance to play. Peter King, on MMQB.com, listed Davis as one of the top five free-agent possibilities for 2015 when he will be restricted.

However, all the accolades were silenced Tuesday when Fisher made the decision to turn the reins over to Shaun Hill, informing both players with phone calls. The team was told in a Wednesday morning meeting as they began preparations for Sunday’s home game against Peyton Manning and the Denver Broncos.

Said Fisher, who appeared to be leaning toward staying with Davis after Sunday’s 31-14 loss to Arizona, “It’s never an easy decision when you make a change in the middle part of the season. We looked at things Monday night and I had lengthy discussions with the offensive staff and just felt that the best thing to do was to lean on the experienced quarterback. I told the team today, in front of Austin, how much I appreciated Austin and his work ethic and his poise, his dedication and the tireless effort that he put in to prepare himself to play. He’s much better now than he was when he started, but I made the decision to go ahead and play with Shaun.

“It’s all out in the open, there’s no controversy. We’re moving forward with an experienced quarterback that for all intent and purposes lost his job because of injury. You all understand why we went that way because of the production that we got earlier out of Austin. The last few weeks have been difficult for him. The defenses that he’s faced have been especially good. Again, I don’t want to present anything that appears to be cloudy, but this is in my opinion and the offensive staff’s opinion, what’s best for this football team right now.”

Fisher said simply, “We’re going to give Shaun an opportunity to do what we brought him here to do. That was to be the backup to Sam (Bradford).”

Hill, who became the starter when Bradford tore his ACL in an Aug. 23 preseason game against Cleveland, played the first half of the season opener against Minnesota, but injured his quad late in the second quarter.

Davis played the rest of that game, and started the next eight. In those first three games, he passed for 937 yards, completing 67.5 percent of his passes with six touchdowns, two interceptions and a 100.6 passer rating. Against the Cowboys and Eagles, the Rams had 448 and 466 yards, respectively. However, in the next five games against difficult defenses — San Francisco twice, Seattle, Kansas City and Arizona — Davis completed just 59.2 of his attempts for 869 yards, six touchdowns, six interceptions and a 73.4 passer rating.

In the last two games against the 49ers and Cardinals, Davis completed 57.0 percent for 481 yards, three touchdowns, five interceptions and a passer rating of 61.2.

Many of the turnovers came in the fourth quarter. Sunday, against Arizona, he had two interceptions in the final quarter, one that was returned for a touchdown, and also had a sack/fumble returned for a score. The Rams lead the NFL with eight return touchdowns against, six of which came on Davis interceptions (four) or sack/fumbles (two).

Fisher said he told Austin of the decision when “I found Austin in the quarterback room last night preparing for this game. We had a great visit, he understands. He talked about the respect factor that he has for those guys that are playing this game really well week, after week, after week because of how hard that position is to play. He’s in a good place. He’s going to prepare just like he has been to back up Shaun.”

Hill said he was “a little bit” surprised when he spoke to Fisher Tuesday. He said, “I missed the first call but then had a text message to call back. I kind of figured something was up. When it’s coach Fisher, you call him back.

“(But) there’s not a whole lot that surprises me anymore to be honest with you.”

He did acknowledge the last eight weeks have been tough because he entered the season with the chance to be a starter after essentially being a career backup.

“Yeah, as a competitor (it was tough),” he said. “At the same time, you still have a job to do. You just kind of have to dust yourself off and go do what you’re asked to do. It was hard, but still at the same time, it’s not like getting cut and you’re out of here. You’ve got to really be able to wipe it off and accept your role at that time. Also, I had the two weeks of injury that I was just fighting to get a jersey. I knew those weeks I wasn’t going to be starting, so as it kind of all played out, the hard part was those two weeks when I was hurt.”

He also understood why he didn’t get the job back when his injury healed. Hill said, “Austin did a great job. He was playing really well. So, surprised? Like I said, not a lot surprises me anymore in this league. Austin was doing a great job. I understood why they did it.

“I accepted my role and tried to focus on that, what I could do to help Austin and what I could do to help the team, giving them a good look throughout the week. You’ve got to just swallow your pride.”

Now, Hill is preparing for the Broncos with a different mindset than he had for the last eight games, saying, “Obviously there’s some excitement that kicks in. But I’m just 1/11th on offense. You go out and you prepare the best you can for Sunday.”