A lost cause for now

NEW YORK -- In the old days, George Steinbrenner would have had a nutty by now.

He already would have met behind closed doors with his manager, probably sunk his teeth into some unsuspecting player. There'd be rumors in the tabloids about Joe Torre's job being in jeopardy.

"Boss fumes!"

"Boss threatens wholesale changes!"

Pitching coach Ron Guidry, legend or not, would be reassigned. Batting coach Don Mattingly, the manager-in-waiting, might have been appointed. Heads would be rolling. Or at least those changes would be threatened. But Steinbrenner isn't seen or heard from much these days.

His Yankees, a team of superstars at nearly every position, have lost seven straight games for the first time in seven years after an 11-4 loss to the Red Sox last night. They have lost four straight to the Sox. They are in last place. Worse than the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. Before we declare the season over in late April, it must be said, the derogatory chants you hear from Sox fans about the Yankees fit right now.

They had been swept by Boston and Tampa Bay, and were coming off a 6-0 loss to Toronto Thursday night.

You'd think last night would have provided motivation for them to start anew. They had touched Daisuke Matsuzaka for six runs in seven innings last Sunday in a 7-6 loss. Yankee players commented they had good looks at Matsuzaka's pitches, which meant Dice-K's delivery was no problem for the upscale New York lineup.

Andy Pettitte was on the mound, and normally that's a good thing. He had a 1.78 ERA coming in. The thought of Pettitte and Chien-Ming Wang pitching in this series certainly gave the Yankees hope that they could reverse the sweep of last weekend.

But what happened?

Pettitte coughed up a 4-2 lead after four innings.

"It was embarrassing," said the lefthander. "I was scuffling from the get-go. It's a joke that I can't get through the sixth or seventh inning."

Yankees center fielder Johnny Damon said, "It's very frustrating. They beat the crap out of us. They turned it into a laugher. We need to get better fast. We can't keep losing and digging ourselves into quite a big hole."

Jorge Posada, who has been superb behind the plate, made a lazy play by not blocking a ball in the dirt, which led to a wild pitch that scored the Sox' fifth run.

In a four-run fourth inning, the Yankees had a chance to put Dice-K away. Though they scored four, it could have been much worse after the Yankees drew three consecutive walks with nobody out. The bottom of the order -- Robinson Cano struck out swinging and Doug Mientkiewicz popped to third -- could have led to a huge inning. But with two outs, the Yankees scraped together a couple of hits and four runs.

They allowed Matsuzaka to settle back in. He retired the side in order in the fifth and sixth, and left after six with a 6-4 lead, earning his second victory over the Yankees in less than a week.

Pettitte, who fell to 13-6 against Boston, was brought back to New York to stop losing streaks and pitch well against the Sox and the other tough American League East teams. He came in 64-27 after a Yankee loss in his career, but with a great opportunity to change the Pinstripes' course, Pettitte came up small.

Through 21 games, the Yankees' bullpen has not registered a save. Mariano Rivera has blown two opportunities. He entered last night's game in the ninth, allowed a run, and then loaded the bases (he faced five batters; four reached) before Torre had to come out and rescue him from further embarrassment, though he said it was to preserve his closer for the remainder of the series.

"We have to keep fighting," said Torre, who indicated Jason Giambi would play first base today. "Nobody is going to give us anything . . . I hope this was the bottoming out. It's the worst we've played. We just have to get feeling good about ourselves again."

Torre said he isn't worried about Rivera because "he just hasn't had regular work all season." Meanwhile, Rivera said of the Yankees' poor play, "We're not going to fix it sitting down. We have to go out there and fix it on the field."

If it wasn't for Alex Rodriguez, the Yankees might not have half of their eight wins. Even with Hideki Matsui and Posada returning to the lineup, they have done nothing to help the victory total.

In 19 games, the Yankees have had to use as least four pitchers. They've allowed six or more runs in eight straight games.

"It's not a good sign when you've got to get your starter in the fifth," Torre said.

The bullpen is a mess since there's no routine, no rhyme or reason to how relievers are used as a result of the poor starting rotation.

"We were proud of our bullpen coming out of camp," Torre said. "We've had to overuse it. I don't anticipate that will continue that way. We want to get well-pitched games from our starters."

Oh, what The Boss would have done in years past. There'd be nobody safe in pinstripes this morning.

Nick Cafardo can be reached at cafardo@globe.com.