Los Angeles

A memorable World Series ended only hours ago, but because the business of baseball is business, there is no time to savor the highlights, no time for fans--old and new--to marvel at what they have just seen.

The thunder of Bank One Ballpark after the Arizona Diamondbacks stunned the New York Yankees is replaced by the drumbeat of contraction, the relentless march of greed.

The collective bargaining agreement binding major league owners and players expires Wednesday. Two of the 30 teams may expire before that.

There has been speculation that owners meeting in Chicago today might close the operations of the Minnesota Twins and Montreal Expos, but that may be all it is, speculation.

The only certainty as the owners face another round of high-octane negotiations with the players’ union is uncertainty.

Of course, the owners have had only five years since their longest and most costly labor dispute to come up with an economic plan the union might swallow, five years in which to reach an agreement before the agreement ran out, and here we are again.

Will there be a lockout, a signing freeze?

Can they persuade the union to accept their economic study committee’s recommendations that include enhanced revenue sharing, a stiffer luxury tax on high payrolls and changes in the amateur draft?

Will they really attempt contraction, braving more court time than O.J.?

Would they consider rolling over the agreement for a year or two at a time when the nation, struggling economically, is at war and has no sympathy or stomach for two groups of millionaires battling to divide $3.6 billion in revenue--a 100% increase since they last attempted to bring down the sport?

Well, when has common sense ever prevailed?

In an industry that has endured eight work stoppages, owners--for now, at least--seem intent on going to bat against a seldom-defeated union, seeking concessions in the salary system while possibly inflaming an improved relationship with the union by possibly voting to contract today, a move many see as simply a bargaining chip in talks with the players.

It is not clear what is going to happen in the meeting, if anything.

Contraction is not on the agenda. Owners and club officials contacted by The Times insist that Commissioner Bud Selig, who never asks for a vote unless he knows the outcome, has not officially canvassed their opinions on contraction.

They also don’t expect the meeting to last much more than three hours, hardly time to review and digest the complexities of contraction and how it relates to their negotiating plan and posture with the union, which insists that the owners can vote to do whatever they want but must eventually bring contraction and its ramifications to the players for final approval.

With all of that, it would be naive to think that Selig doesn’t know where the votes rest on contraction--”The very concept of contraction came from a large number of owners,” he said in a recent interview--or that the subject couldn’t be introduced today despite the agenda.

Speculation is rampant. Among the scenarios:

* Owners will vote to contract the Twins and Expos, either in 2002 or 2003 or some unspecified date in the future.

* Owners will vote to approve contraction without specifying a date or teams, allowing Selig to use it as a negotiating chip.

* Owners will not vote, with Selig and baseball’s lawyers still unable to tie together what he calls the “thousand moving parts” of contraction, and the outside possibility the Florida Marlins could still replace the Twins on the contraction block.

(The decision of Florida General Manager Dave Dombrowski to accept the Detroit Tigers’ front-office offer--and the fact that Florida owner John Henry continues to cast covetous eyes at the Angels--illustrates the ongoing uncertainty in Miami.)

Reached at his home in Scottsdale, Ariz., before Game 7 of the World Series, Selig said there has been no definitive decision on contraction but that it remains a viable option.

Viable?

Owners spell that two ways:

* L-e-v-e-r-a-g-e. The thinking is that by wiping out 50 major league jobs owners would finally gain negotiating leverage over the players. The move, however, would probably make the union--which has yet to hear from the owners regarding contraction--more resistant to salary concessions, even if owners agreed to expand the 25-man rosters to 26. Union officials also worry that a dispersal draft of contracted players would depress the free-agent market for that particular year and for the next few years.

* E-x-t-o-r-t-i-o-n. The possible elimination of the Twin Cities, the nation’s 14th-leading TV market, might provide Minnesota legislators with a final timetable for funding a new ballpark, might open a market for those teams having difficulty getting public funding for a new ballpark (as the San Francisco Giants, Chicago White Sox and others used the Tampa Bay area) and might provide Selig’s pal Carl Pohlad, the multibillionaire Twins’ owner, with a buyout far in excess of his franchise value.

It has been speculated that baseball would pay Pohlad and Montreal owner Jeffrey Loria as much as $250 million each to contract, prorated among the individual clubs, an investment they would recoup over time, as the theory goes, by retaining the revenue-sharing, licensing and national TV money that is now going to the Expos and Twins annually.

The hitch in all that is this: How much beyond the $500 million would owners have to pay in legal battles with vacated cities, media outlets and stadium authorities, not to mention possible breach-of-contract suits from dispersed players.

Wouldn’t $500 million be better spent on new stadium construction, as the NFL does?

Wouldn’t it be better spent on territorial indemnification for the Giants and Baltimore Orioles so that the Oakland A’s could move to Santa Clara and the Expos to Northern Virginia?

The report by the owners’ economic study committee said that contraction shouldn’t be necessary if all its recommendations were accepted, including, when necessary, franchise relocation.

At this point, however, it isn’t certain in which direction Selig will lead his flock, or if he even knows. The union is nervous about that, growing impatient at the absence of substantive talks.

There have been meetings between union officials and two management figures it respects--baseball’s chief operating officer, Paul Beeston, and lead labor lawyer, Rob Manfred--but Selig pulled the plug on those talks several weeks ago, leading to concern that he didn’t want the conciliatory Beeston and Manfred getting too far in the negotiations and that he eventually plans to come at the union with a harder edge.

Although the relationship has improved since Selig canceled the 1994 World Series amid a work stoppage that didn’t end until a federal judge found the owners guilty of illegal labor practice, there is considerable history at the edges and the union worries that Selig is under the thumb of a group of more militant, generally smaller market owners. They include Kansas City’s David Glass, Houston’s Drayton McLane, San Diego’s John Moores, Chicago’s Jerry Reinsdorf and the Twins’ Pohlad.

Of course, being commissioner isn’t easy. Selig has to deal with 30 owners with 30 agendas.

Maybe we’ll know more about contraction, more about what direction Selig intends to take the labor talks, more about the possibility of a sensible rollover or a hard-line signing freeze, after today’s meeting.

Maybe after today we’ll even be talking about 28 owners with 28 agendas.