No. 42

It's the 63rd anniversary of Jackie Robinson breaking the color line in baseball. To mark it, many MLB players will wear no. 42 this afternoon and tonight. But only one player wears that number day in and day out. And he's the right player to do so.

Given her deep Dodger roots and a soft spot for the Mets, Rachel Robinson has never been one to get her baseball fix in what was once sworn enemy territory, the Bronx. At 87, she attended opening day last week at Citi Field. But her plan was to be at the Stadium on Thursday night with her daughter, Sharon, and her grandson, Jesse Simms, for what has become an annual celebration of her husband’s indelible mark on American history.

The No. 42 jerseys will again be worn in major league parks, but only Rivera’s will be seen again and again, or with every jog in from the bullpen until, well, sometime within the next decade.

“I’ve been very pleased that he is the last one to wear Jack’s number,” Rachel Robinson said in a recent telephone interview. “I had admired Mariano Rivera for so long from afar.”

In late January, they were brought together when Rivera, along with Hank Aaron, attended a fund-raising reception for the Jackie Robinson Foundation in Lower Manhattan. In a Q. and A. forum, Rivera talked about “the privilege and the pressure” of wearing 42. The privilege was for obvious reasons, he said. The pressure was “because of the way Jackie Robinson conducted himself to make the best for his people, and for all minorities.

“So I know I am always watched, under the microscope,” he said.

Rivera paused, not for effect but because he is a serious, contemplative man. He added: “It’s a challenge, you know?”

Rachel Robinson said Rivera had nothing to worry about; he had long since risen to the number’s principles and behavioral standards.

“I believe there is integrity attached to it,” she said. “And I would hope it would always represent individuals who stand up for the things they believe in. I know that the Latino population has suffered through many of the challenges we have as African-Americans, so to have someone who conducts himself in the way Mariano Rivera does, that’s what we want to teach our young people.”

I just hope the situation (the Yankees leading after 8), calls for Mariano to pitch tonight.