Take Boston. Last year, Keith Foulke arrived to be a reliable closer. But in 2003, the main man in the pen was Byung-Hyun Kim, who had just 16 saves. Nine other relievers had a total of 20 more saves among them. In 2002, Ugueth Urbina, who was acquired on the 2001 trade deadline to replace Derek Lowe as closer, did the honors. In 2000, Lowe had the job and in 1999, it was close-by-committee with Lowe, Tim Wakefield and Tom Gordon. Gordon had taken over the job at the trade deadline in 1997, when the previous closer, Heathcliff Slocumb was traded to Seattle for Lowe and Jason Varitek. That’s seven closers in nine seasons.

Since 1997, the Braves have used Mark Wohlers, Kerry Lightenberg, John Rocker, Mike Remlinger, John Smoltz, who held the job for three full years, and now Chris Reitsma and Dan Kolb.

The A’s are using Huston Street and have also used Octavio Dotel this year. Since 1997, they’ve used Dotel, Arthur Rhodes, Keith Foulke, Billie Koch, Jason Isringhausen, Doug Jones and Billy Taylor.

For the Cubs, the list is Rick Dempster, LaTroy Hawkins, Joe Borowski, Antonio Alfonseca, Jeff Fassero, Tom Gordon, Rick Aguilera, Terry Adams, Rod Beck and Turk Wendell, which is one more than one closer a year.

That’s the rule in the game. Even the Mets, who stay with a closer longer than almost anyone else, have had three in nine years — John Franco, Armando Benitez and Braden Looper.

But for the Yankees, there’s been just Mo. Year in and year out, he’s been there to save the day and make all those other guys with all those bloated salaries look good. He’s the reason they’ve made the playoffs every year, the reason they won the World Series in three straight seasons, 1998-2000, the reason they got to the Series two other times, the reason there’s still hope in this season.

Only once has he been injured. That was in 2002, and it took three pitchers - Mike Stanton, Steve Karsay and Ramiro Mendoza, who picked up 22 saves among them – to fill his shoes.

The body is still skinny, but the shoes get bigger by the day. The Yankees can survive losing five starting pitchers. They could get along if Derek Jeter or A-Rod or Gary Sheffield or any one player went down.

But they can’t live without Rivera. There’s no longer any question, if there ever was. When you talk about the most valuable Yankee, the discussion starts and ends with number 42.

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