IT IS a quarter of a century now, a quarter of a century since Thurman Munson gained immortality by meeting his mortality in one of the cruelest ways imaginable. For it was 25 years ago tomorrow that the Pride of the ’70s Yankees literally went down in flames, losing his life when the Cessna Citation he was piloting crashed in Canton, Ohio, while he was practicing takeoffs and landings.

He was 32, Munson was, and now, all these years later, it often seems as if the circumstances of his tragic demise have formed more the foundation of his legend than his greatness on the diamond. He has almost been reduced to just another number – 15 – on the facing of a monument park that has become overcrowded with the inclusion of good-but-not-great Yankees such as Dave Winfield, just another instant classic installment on networks such as YES and ESPN that often confuse the mundane with the extraordinary.

Life is unfair. So is death.

Munson need not be idealized in death beyond what he was in life, and he will not be so lionized in this space.

But beyond recognizing the anniversary of his death – 25 years, already? 25 years, only? – and beyond paying tribute to a 1979 Yankees team that responded to the ultimate adversity with grace and class rarely seen among any group, the catcher’s significance not as a symbol but rather as a baseball player is to be reaffirmed here today.

Because so many fans just don’t know.

The game was different then. It wasn’t muscle-ball. So the statistics must be kept in perspective, the numbers that testify that Munson, beaten, battered and bruised playing a game behind the plate so much more physically challenging than today’s, hit .300 while driving in at least 100 runs in each of the final three full seasons of his life, from 1976 through 1978, thus becoming the first Yankee to accomplish that feat since Joe DiMaggio 36 years earlier. He was the American League MVP in 1976, the Rookie of the Year in 1970. He won three Gold Gloves. He had a lifetime batting average of .373 in his three World Series, hit .339 in his three AL Championship Series.

But mere recitation of the numbers don’t do Munson justice, either. Perhaps Munson – chosen to serve as the first Yankee captain since Lou Gehrig – can be best appreciated in this context. He could have played with Murderer’s Row, could have played with Joe D’s teams, could have played with the Bombers of the ’50s, with the M&M Boys of the ’60s. And he could have played beside Derek Jeter for Joe Torre. He would have belonged with any of them.

Munson was a Yankee for the Ages. Even if – and not because – he didn’t live to the age of 33.

There has never quite been an itinerary like it in major league history. Has never quite been an itinerary like the one the grief-stricken Yankees followed on Aug. 6, 1979.

Four days following Munson’s death, the club flew to Canton for their fallen captain’s funeral and burial before returning home to play a night game at the Stadium against the Orioles.

It was a day and night that disproved the adage. For there was crying in baseball.

There was crying outside of the funeral home, there was crying throughout the eulogies delivered by Munson’s best friends, Lou Piniella and Bobby Murcer. There was crying throughout the procession from the funeral home to the cemetery and there was crying that night at the ballpark when Murcer himself found the strength to knock in all five runs in a 5-4 victory achieved on his two-run, ninthinning single.

That is the game one network or the other shows in tribute to Munson; that one, not the ones in which he starred, not the great playoff game against Kansas City in which he hit that gargantuan game-winning home run to left-center that would have even cleared – yes – Death Valley in the old Stadium.

But that kind of figures, doesn’t it? That kind of figures when the legend overtakes the man, when the death overtakes the life. But doesn’t make it right.

So tomorrow say a prayer in the memory of Thurman Munson. Celebrate his life. Commemorate his career. Honor the man and honor the player who, as one, were even greater than the legend that has overtaken them both.

(Larry Brooks chronicled Munson’s funeral and that night’s game vs. the Orioles for The Post).