BASEBALL WORLD SUFFERS BIG LOSS : O'MALLEY WILL BE HARD TO REPLACE.

Byline: KEVIN MODESTI

Well, this isn't like Peter O'Malley at all, hogging the spotlight, causing a fuss.

I'm sure that if he could think of a way to put Los Angeles' most cherished institution up for sale without holding a press conference, without getting his name in headlines and his photo on the front page, he would do it.

Because the way it works with the Dodgers president and patriarch, his players get the attention, his managers make the speeches, and his rivals among baseball owners get caricatured on ``Seinfeld.''

Meanwhile, O'Malley is the owner you never have to think about.

But we're going to be thinking about him a lot from now until he follows through on the plan to sell the team - and probably for long beyond then.

Did you pity Greg Brock when he tried to replace Steve Garvey at first base? Do you wonder if quiet man Bill Russell can fill Tom Lasorda's squeaky shoes? Will you fear for the physical safety of the poor sap who will take Vin Scully's place in the booth someday?

Then imagine trying to replace Peter and the O'Malley family.

If this sounds too much like an obituary, there's a reason. As of Monday afternoon, when the dean of major-league club presidents announced that the team will be sold to a yet-to-be determined buyer, the Dodgers as we knew them ceased to exist.

The colors will never change. Clean, serene Dodger Stadium isn't going anywhere. And knowing O'Malley, he won't hand over the keys to just anyone, so the Dodgers will be in reliable hands.

But if you're a Dodgers fan, much of what you love about the franchise - ``stability'' is the word everybody uses - comes directly from the bespectacled, understated man in the back row of the owner's box.

If you never thought about it that way before, that's just how O'Malley wants it. Most fans in the Dodger Stadium stands never give the owner's box a thought, unless Lasorda is waving from the front row, or a United States president is visiting.

Reporters rarely think to get Peter on the phone, even though his home number hasn't changed in the 25 years since he ascended to the club presidency in 1970.

This is not his father's ownership style. Walter O'Malley, who led the Dodgers to this promised land, was your basic larger-than-life character, back when there was more elbow room in the sports world.

This is an ownership style - Peter's - seen too rarely.

The last time I sat down for an interview with O'Malley, during spring training in Vero Beach, Fla., a few years ago, he had just returned from an ocean fishing trip with some Dodgertown guests. The guests told how Peter and his then-teen-age sons were among the few sailors who didn't get sick on the rough sea.

O'Malley agreed this was an apt metaphor for his management style. He talked about that style proudly.

``I really don't reach out for headlines or interviews,'' he said. ``A lot of people in my position do, and I guess Exhibit A would be (Yankees owner George) Steinbrenner - not only seeking the publicity of the back page of the (New York) Daily News, but his management style of change and turmoil and controversy.

``I'm just the opposite. To me, stability and continuity make a lot more sense than just continuing to stir the pot.''

He continued: ``Things don't always work out, but you have to have some planning to your decisions. My friend George in New York, I don't know what his plan is. He appears not to have a plan. His plan must be `change' . . .''

If George had owned the Dodgers, they would have employed a dozen managers in the time O'Malley had just one, Lasorda.

Al Campanis, the general manager O'Malley fired after being dragged into the spotlight 10 years ago, wrote a book, ``The Dodger Way to Play Baseball.'' O'Malley ought to write a book, ``My Way to Own a Sports Franchise.''

When he sells, it's the Dodgers' loss, it's baseball's loss.

Maybe he'll take the hundreds of millions of dollars the sale will bring, and buy the city a new NFL franchise, something he has hinted at doing.

Or maybe there's a better outlet for O'Malley's talent, a better use for his steady hand at the tiller.

The campaign starts here: Peter O'Malley for baseball commissioner.