By JOHN DELCOS
The (Westchester, N.Y.) Journal News

KISSIMMEE, Fla. - Yogi Berra remembers the conversation, every word, but more importantly, the emotion and history that forged its sentiment.

It was prior to Game 1 of the 1999 American League Championship Series when Berra approached Bernie Williams in the New York Yankees clubhouse.

Berra, a Hall of Famer known for fracturing the English language - "Yogi-isms" they are called - looked into Williams' eyes and spoke with the clarity and passion of a prosecuting attorney.

"I told him, 'They can't beat us. They haven't been able to beat us for 80 years and they aren't going to beat us now,' " Berra said Saturday as he alternately watched the Yankees take batting practice and sign autographs for awestruck Houston Astros prospects. "It's an intense rivalry, but something always happens."

It was the antithesis to Berra's "it ain't over until it's over" axiom because the rivalry's history has been painted pinstripes, and it's been that way since Jan. 3, 1920, when the financially strapped Boston Red Sox sold Babe Ruth to the Yankees to pay their bills.

Since then, the coin usually lands New York.

It did when the Red Sox, needing to split their final two games of the 1949 season, lost both at Yankee Stadium and blew the pennant. It did in 1978, when the Red Sox coughed up a 14-game game lead to the Yankees. They were dazed in the Boston Massacre - a four-game sweep in Fenway Park in early September - then knocked out of a one-game playoff by Bucky Dent's drive over the Green Monster.

The Yankees pulled out Games 1 and 2 of the 1999 AL Championship, and survived Roger Clemens getting ripped in Game 3, to reach the World Series.

"The Red Sox have more demons to deal with than we do," Yankees manager Joe Torre said. "Are they satisfied with the need to beat the Yankees, or is it the need not to lose?"

Yankees-Red Sox is a real rivalry, Torre said, its roots in history, in competing for the same goal for a century, in the dueling of its stars, whether it be Joe DiMaggio or Ted Williams, Thurman Munson or Carlton Fisk, or Derek Jeter or Nomar Garciaparra.

The Mets, said Torre, "is more a carnival atmosphere, except for when we played them in the World Series."

Yankees-Mets is made-for-TV, made for the back pages, made for the egos of the two ownerships, and with the exception of the Clemens-Mike Piazza incident, has been void of the passion that always marks the calendar for Boston.

"Warlike," is the term Torre used to describe the intensity of the Red Sox rivalry. "Just before the game starts you feel a buzz."

A buzz, the sound of angry hornets, has been heard from the executive offices of both teams this winter.

Unable to beat the Yankees on the field, the Red Sox have unsuccessfully tried to take them on in the boardroom. They were outbid by the Yankees to retain Williams after the 1998 season, and outmaneuvered in the hotel lobby last Christmas Eve in losing Cuban defector Jose Contreras.

Even though the Red Sox booked an entire floor of rooms to block the Yankees, they couldn't get it done.

Red Sox president Larry Lucchino, who sparred with owner George Steinbrenner while with Baltimore and San Diego, called the Yankees "the Evil Empire," which if it already hasn't, will find its way onto T-shirts this summer in Fenway Park.

Jeter laughed at the term, smiled and said, "It's going to be a little spicy this year, won't it?"

It will if the winter is any indication.

Steinbrenner returned serve four days later, saying, "I've learned this about Lucchino: He's baseball's foremost chameleon of all time. He changes colors depending on where he's standing ... He talks out of both sides of his mouth."

Two days later, not exactly shaken, Lucchino came back with: "Is that the best he could do?"

Apparently not, as two weeks later, the Yankees skunked the Red Sox again, pulling off a three-way deal with Montreal and the Chicago White Sox that not only freed them of Orlando Hernandez, but more importantly, kept Bartolo Colon out of Boston.

Lucchino had long been a thorn to Steinbrenner, chairing a baseball cable television committee in the early 1990s that ruled the Yankees should pay more into the general fund because of their deal with the Madison Square Garden Network, and last year working on Commissioner Bud Selig's board that increased the payroll luxury tax.

"I think there's a large set of people for whom George Steinbrenner has venom," Lucchino said. "Perhaps it's a badge of honor. If it's true, I'll wear it as a badge of honor."

Lucchino's boss, Red Sox owner John Henry, used to be a limited Yankees partner with Steinbrenner, and as the saying goes, there's nothing as limited as being a limited partner with Steinbrenner.

"It's very difficult to bid against a team with an unlimited budget," Henry said. "With an unlimited budget, you can buy anyone you think you need."

Stung, Steinbrenner took his frustrations out on Jeter and Torre's coaching staff, and let general manager Brian Cashman and club president Randy Levine do his talking.

"It's clear it's sour grapes," Cashman said. "The player said he took less money to come to us. At the end of the day, the player said he wanted to be a Yankee and chose to sign with us."

Levine, in the wake of the Contreras signing, bristled when asked about Yankees' free spending, player-grubbing perception, especially considering it was Lucchino's work that brought about the revenue sharing and luxury tax formulas.

"The typical whining that's going on has to stop," Levine said. "The days of trying to hide your own problems by blaming the Yankees are over. We're playing by the rules."

The whining, at least publicly, has been ordered to stop by Selig, but nobody thinks that will happen, especially if the Red Sox aren't able to sign Pedro Martinez by the end of spring training.

After this season, Martinez becomes a free agent, and after this year, Clemens and David Wells will be gone. It's too easy to resist, especially after Henry's pre-emptive posturing that merely opens the door.

"It's hard to put a price on Pedro Martinez as a leader, as a player, as one of the greatest pitchers in the history of the game," Henry said this week. "How do you put a price? It's difficult to do, especially in a declining market."

Steinbrenner knows how.

The Red Sox not only open the season with questions in their rotation, while the Yankees' concern is getting down to seven, but in their bullpen, where they will attempt to replace Ugueth Urbina.

"Maybe they know what they are doing," said the Yankees' Mariano Rivera, tongue-in-cheek.

Maybe they do, and maybe they'll keep Martinez, and maybe they'll beat the Yankees when it counts.

Maybe.

Bill James, the statistician, who was Boston's biggest postseason hire, might be able to figure out the probability.

It's been said statistics can be interpreted any way, but since the Ruth sale, it's hard to find any other meaning in the numbers that read 26 World Series titles for the Yankees and none for Boston.

The sweetest came in 1949 for Berra, whose memory of it was sharp Saturday as he recalled that weekend. When asked if beating Boston to win the pennant made it that much sweeter, Berra said nothing.

There was no need; the smile on his face said it all.