11:58 AM EST on Tuesday, December 13, 2005

Let's see if I've got this straight.

The Red Sox went to the winter meetings in Dallas last week looking to trade Manny, and ended up tradings Edgar Renteriasand Doug Mirabelli.

So by my count, they now have two third basemen, no shortstop, no center fielder, a left fielder who doesn't want to be here, a shortstop in Baltimore who does want to be here, and a certain unemployed pitcher in Texas they're supposedly interested in. All they need is two French hens and a partridge in a pear tree and it really will be a Merry Christmas.

Oh, yeah.

But they do finally have a general manager.

Two of them, in fact.

With Theo Epstein waiting in the wings to be the head of baseball operations, adviser, consultant, grand poobah, whatever.

At least that's the new word.

Welcome to the soap opera.

Let's not kid ourselves here. This is the male version of General Hospital, Days of Our Lives with monster seats. This is one of

the greatest soap operas there is, with plot twists and turns, infighting, palace secrets, the apparent return of the prodigal son, the whole enchilada.

It's been six weeks now since Theo resigned, complete with a Fenway Park press conference, and bewildered principal owner John Henry raising questions about whether he's qualified to own the team. Six weeks of speculation about who the next general manager was going to be, with prospective candidates brought in as if this were some baseball version of community auditions. Six weeks of Larry Lucchino essentially hiding in his bunker as the verbal bombs exploded all around him. Six weeks of uncertainty.

Six weeks of As The World Turns in cleats.

Yesterday it ended.

At least for a while.

For the first time since Theo inexplicably walked away from a contract extension that was going to quadruple his salary, a little bit of stability returned to the Red Sox. For the first time in six weeks the Red Sox had their spin back in place, the sense they were in control of things, instead of playing catchup, like some team three runs down in the bottom of the ninth. For the first time in six weeks the Red Sox finally seemed like the Red Sox.

That was always the thing about this new ownership group, the sense that they were extremely competent, knew what they were doing, were masters of public relations. Wasn't that Lucchino's great skill? Whether apearing weekly on a Boston radio show or doing appearances, Lucchino was the public face of the franchise, one that had finally brought a world title to Boston, and made Fenway Park better in the process.

Which only made it more bizarre when Lucchino went into symbolic hiding after Theo's departure. For the first time in four years it suddenly seemed like the same old Red Sox, self-destructive, bumbling, their own worst enemy, a perception that's only grown over the last six weeks as the soap opera continued to play out.

And hovering over all of it was the unspoken presence of Theo Epstein, the onetime "boy genius," whose sudden departure seemingly had unraveled everything. This only increased when Theo did not take a job, but kept being out there. Which only makes yesterday's development more interesting.

Consider these three questions:

If Jed Hoyer and Ben Cherington are such obvious candidates to be co-general managers, why did it take six weeks to hire them?

If Epstein does indeed come back, what does that mean to Lucchino, when it was as obvious as a Schilling fastball that Theo left in the first place because he couldn't get along with Lucchino?

And if Epstein really is going to come back, why wouldn't it be as general manager, considering both Cherington and Hoyer worked for him before?

Just asking.

But there's no question Lucchino threw the olive branch to Epstein yesterday, saying we are "keeping a light in the window," and "we would welcome him." If you didn't know better, you might even have believed him.

There are still questions, certainly, the biggest being that if Epstein actually returns what would his actual role be?

But that's the question for another time. For now, the Sox have co-general managers, and the specter of Theo riding in to save the day, like the cavalry coming over the hill in a cowboy movie. There's also the sense they're finally in control of their universe again, Lucchino out in front yesterday, the uncertainty silenced, everything right with the world again.

At least for now.

So what if they have two third basemen, no shortstop, no center fielder, and a left fielder who doesn't want to be here?

It's not even Christmas yet.

And the word is the two French hens and a partridge in a pear tree will be arriving any day now.