BOSTON — Are you ready for 17 more like this one? Seventeen more games full of high drama, late-inning lead changes, new heroes and old villains?

Say this for the Red Sox and Yankees — they don’t need much warming up. No need for a handful of pedestrian, run-of-the-mill contests to ramp up for a special showdown.

Nope, no (re-)introductions necessary. Right out of the chute, first meeting of the season and presto, instant classic.

In both Boston and New York, it is often said that the baseball season doesn’t truly get under way until the first Red Sox-Yankee clash. All the rest is table-setting, the preamble before the real thing, the act you’ve known for all these years.

Until the late going last night, this was all about the Yankees, who carried a seemingly comfortable 6-2 lead into the bottom of the eighth. But before the inning was through, the Red Sox had stormed back with five runs, all but one of them scoring with indefatigable Mariano Rivera on the mound.

Red Sox 7, Yankees 6. And just like that, the Red Sox had somehow managed to graft a bit of October 2004 magic onto April of 2007.

“To win a game like that,” said Terry Francona in the immediate aftermath, “against that team, is very helpful. It will help down the road.”

“It hurts,” said his counterpart, Joe Torre. “We let it get away from us.”

The heroes? Coco Crisp, fighting to retain his job, electrifying Fenway with a triple into the corner, scoring two teammates ahead of him. Alex Cora, for the second time in as many days, driving home the go-ahead run, this time with a soft flare over a drawn-in infield (“All we needed,” according to a grateful Francona), invoking memories of Luis Gonzalez in Game 7 of the 2001 World Series. And finally, Hideki Okajima, of all people, turning back the Yanks in the ninth, protecting the slimmest of leads.

The afternoon had begun with questions directed at Francona regarding the availability of Jonathan Papelbon, who had thrown 47 pitches the previous two days. Francona, showing that he might have picked up a thing or two sitting next to Bill Belichick, danced around a nicely worded “MYOB.”

Francona said that his counterpart in the Yankee dugout, Joe Torre, didn’t need any extra help managing. How ironic, then, that the game should turn on Torre’s decision to go to Rivera with five outs to go.

In spring training, Torre had promised that the days of reaching for Rivera in the eighth were over, in deference to Rivera’s advancing years. It took only a sniff of a late-inning uprising for Torre to disregard his own statement.

When it’s Red Sox-Yankees, even in April, all the rules go out the window.

For seven innings, this was the Alex Rodriguez Show. Rodriguez hit a solo homer off Curt Schilling in the fourth, added a three-run clout into the home bullpen in the fifth, and doubled and scored in the eighth.

It’s been a magical April for Rodriguez, one that has seen him finally begin to win the affection and approval of demanding Yankee fans. He’s reached 12 home runs faster than anyone in American League history and whatever the reason for his historic start — the promise of an opt-out clause at the end of the year; his psychological unburdening regarding his relationship with teammate/archrival Derek Jeter — it’s been a magical month.

“He’s remarkable,” Torre said. “I’ve run out of words and superlatives to describe what he’s into right now.”

But even Rodriguez knows that he’ll ultimately be judged by his last at-bat. In the big picture, that means his performance in October, when all Yankee heroes are fitted for immortality. In the here and now, that was the ninth inning last night when, with Bobby Abreu representing the potential tying run at first, Rodriguez lined harmlessly to second.

In New York, that undoubtedly left some claiming this is the same ol’ A-Rod — otherworldly output, but not always dependable with things — a game, a season, a playoff series — on the line.

Francona finally tipped his hand regarding Papelbon when he got Okajima up in the bottom of the eighth with the Sox surging from behind.

“The closer we got,” said Francona, “I’ll admit, there was a little bit of anxiety (because Papelbon wasn’t available).”

Okajima was on the mound for the final three outs in the ninth and for his first major league save, finishing with a flourish by fanning Kevin Thompson.

“There’s a lot of side stories to this one,” said Schilling, the starter and near-afterthought. “Everybody should be feeling real good about what we did.

New season, new faces. Same old rivalry.

smcadam@projo.com