Separate Talks With Mediator Today : Baseball: Behind the scenes, Colorado, Toronto owners are said to be in touch with union officials.

Amid behind-the-scenes activity involving club and union officials, negotiators for major league baseball owners and striking players will meet separately today with federal mediators in New York.

The owners, acting commissioner Bud Selig said Tuesday, have no plans to change the salary-cap proposal that has polarized the sides through 19 days of the strike, and there is no indication that a last-ditch attempt by some high-revenue owners and executives to save the season through informal communication with union officials has been successful.

Colorado Rockie owner Jerry McMorris and Toronto Blue Jay president Paul Beeston, with the knowledge of Selig and chief negotiator Richard Ravitch, according to a source, have been the primary architects of an unpublicized effort to keep the process alive.

McMorris said he had no comment on his private talks with the union but added that it is critical a settlement be reached in the next 10 days if the season is to be saved.

“There is a theory that we can go directly to the playoffs from the position the clubs are in now, but I’d hate to see that happen,” he said. “I’d like to see at least two weeks of play before the playoffs start.”

Meanwhile, Boston Red Sox CEO John Harrington and Philadelphia Phillie Executive Vice President David Montgomery will join Ravitch and his staff in today’s meeting with mediators. No players are expected to attend the mediator’s later session with the union, and Donald Fehr, the union’s executive director, said he did not anticipate any meaningful results.

In two developments Tuesday:

--Selig said a quarterly owners meeting scheduled for Detroit next week has been canceled but denied that it was an attempt to stifle possible dissent among the owners regarding the stalemated talks or the ongoing attempt to sell the players on a salary cap.

Selig said a conference call with his executive council and other owners Tuesday failed to produce any opposition to the cancellation.

“This was one time I was willing to let the minority rule if a fair number of clubs wanted a meeting, but there was frankly no desire,” he said. “As long as the players are on strike, the clubs felt there was no useful purpose spending a couple of days in meetings and diverting attention from the effort to resolve the dispute.”

--While the 25-man postseason rosters would normally have had to be set by midnight tonight, the union agreed to a management suggestion that teams will have until 48 hours after a settlement to submit postseason rosters. However, teams will still have only until midnight tonight to trade for a player who would be eligible for postseason competition.

The agreement allows the Dodgers, for example, to keep Jose Offerman, who might otherwise have been recalled to be eligible for the playoffs, in uniform at Albuquerque.

“This helps us a great deal,” Dodger Executive Vice President Fred Claire said. “We’ve been sitting here for the last 48 hours working on the postseason roster, but now we don’t have to disrupt the Albuquerque team (as it prepares for the Pacific Coast League playoffs) or take any young players out of the developmental arena.”