MESS CREATED BY O'MALLEY CLEANED UP BY CUNNING OF FOX.

Byline: KEVIN MODESTI

Mike Piazza, a home-bred Dodger and a could-be Hall of Famer still in his prime, is a Florida Marlin. Gary Sheffield, emotionally and physically fragile but an all-around great hitter, is a Dodger.

And that's only the second most shocking switch to take place.

Rupert Murdoch is the good guy in this boardroom drama. Peter O'Malley is the goat.

Now, that's a role reversal.

The question, after the Dodgers indicated they're willing to ship Piazza out of town in a seven-player trade, is what this says about the team's new owners, the media barons of Murdoch's Fox Group.

The answer: It says they inherited a heck of a mess when they took over from the O'Malley regime in March, and they've found a way to clean up, swinging a trade that would help the team in the short and long runs.

Maybe goat is too strong a word for O'Malley. But the ugly contractual situation that prompted all this was caused by the O'Malley management's failure to sign Piazza to a long-term extension.

Not last winter, after a .362, 40-homer, 120-RBI season inflated his price for a seven-year contract to nine figures. Two winters ago, when the same thing would have cost $50-60 million, or approximately what Raul Mondesi is getting now.

At the time, of course, O'Malley had just put the Dodgers up for sale precisely because of baseball economic conditions under which an old family firm couldn't afford to do right by a superstar like Piazza. He wasn't about to make the deal under which a trade like this would be unimaginable. He offered one year and eventually signed Piazza for two.

So, when Fox came in, Piazza was entering his final contract year and the Dodgers had three choices. Give Piazza what he wanted, more than $100 million for seven years. Wait till the end of the season and gamble that they wouldn't lose him to free agency, getting only a draft pick as compensation. Or trade him now, guaranteeing something in return.

Those options were obvious when the season started. What became clear only in the past month is that the Dodgers had problems all over the field, and not only would re-signing Piazza solve none of them, it would tie up money that could.

Having done little in the offseason to improve a second-place team, Dodgers management banked on a young roster clicking all at once. It wasn't happening, and it was time to try something new.

Along came the Marlins, desperate to trade Sheffield and Bonilla and complete the stripping of their World Series-winning payroll, and you had two clubs in position to rip each other off. A Blockbuster trade, indeed.

However the trade came about - it appears Dodgers executive vice president Fred Claire had merely an advisory role - it's a good sign that Fox wanted to make a move like this.

If you believe the caricature of the company as all entertainment and no substance, you'd assume Fox would sign the popular Piazza and tell him to grow his hair long. Instead, it realized that winning is the best entertainment. Look at how the Lakers have dominated the headlines, an unintended blessing for the Dodgers the way they've been playing.

``I don't know if it's so much the direction we're going,'' first baseman Eric Karros said, asked what this foreshadows, ``but they came in and felt they needed to inject some sort of . . . I don't know if you want to call it life or whatever. They needed to make a splash and they definitely did.''

In Sheffield, who is 29 years old like Piazza, the Dodgers get a new 30-home-run man and the everyday left fielder they need.

In the switch-hitting Bonilla, though he's 35, they get a third baseman to replace Todd Zeile, who goes to Florida with Piazza, and they finally have some left-handed power.

In Charles Johnson, 26, they get the strong defensive catcher Piazza never was, though that won't make up for Piazza's un-catcher-like presence in the batter's box.

In Jim Eisenreich, 39, they get a veteran pinch-hitter.

That's a lot of holes to fill with one trade.

Of course, there's more to be done to bring the Dodgers up to where they thought they were all along. Like finding a No. 2 hitter, a center fielder, a bullpen closer and another starting pitcher to improve a rotation continually overrated by a pitcher-friendly ballpark.

This way, at least, Dodgers management knows it has the money to do those things, instead of committing too much to one player.

Nobody wants to trade a Hall of Famer in his prime. But that's the kind of mess the club was in.

Under the circumstances, a foxy deal.