NEW YORK -- Somebody needs to step up.

This is no longer about injuries, or what-could-have-beens. We aren't talking about lineup changes, absences of bats or bullpen Black Holes. The Rays are losing (five straight, to be exact), and there is an opportunity to be had for these Red Sox. A few well-placed members of Terry Francona's team have to realize this and drag themselves off the treadmill on which they seem all too comfortable and officially make this a race.

Ailments or not, they are good enough, Tampa Bay (which has two of its starters heading to the doctor for arm evaluations) is mortal enough and now it's just a matter of somebody on the Red Sox grabbing the rope the Rays seem to be extending.

Perhaps it starts Monday with Jon Lester taking the reins. Or perhaps one of the bat-wielding members of the Sox' lineup supplies the much-needed momentum. But what Sunday night's 7-2 loss to the Yankees suggested is that not one member of the Red Sox has yet to shake this team out of its morass of mediocrity. 

They have players on this roster -- not on any disabled lists -- who have done it before. Jacoby Ellsbury, David Ortiz, David Ortiz, Adrian Beltre, J.D. Drew, and starters like the one who took the latest loss, Josh Beckett. They have all gone on the kinds of rolls that allow for winning to seemingly be the only course of action.

"We're right there," said Sox second baseman Bill Hall after his team's second straight loss to the Yankees.

True. Now the question is who is going to push them past the edge of confusion?

There were plenty of tangible reasons why things didn't work out in the Sox' latest loss. And, yes, shouting, screaming or casting blame isn't going to take any kind of a chunk out of what is now a 4 1/2-game hole in the Wild Card race. This offered a reminder that carrying a team comes down to execution, and that's what lends itself to heroics. In this case, start with Josh Beckett (because most everybody else will) …

The popular avenue taken following his uncomfortable-looking, 4 2/3-inning, seven-run, 11-hit outing will be regarding how the Yankees have apparently snuck into Beckett's head. The results? In four appearances against the team he HAS to beat, the righty has allowed 24 earned runs in 19 1/3 innings, never giving up less than five runs and never lasting more than 5 1/3 frames.

Beckett's analysis had nothing to do with psychology or recent history. 

''I think I just threw too many balls over the fat part of the plate. It's pretty simple," he said. "They don't hit balls out of the strike zone that hard. I think location comes into it. You leave too many balls over the middle of the plate, you'll find the good part of the bat.''

And when asked if his stuff was as good as it had been during what had been a run of successful starts, Beckett's response was, "I think so, but it's hard to tell when it never hits the catcher's mitt."

Look a little deeper and you'll find another example of this not being a case of pinstripe-induced paranoia, but yet another case of failed execution. Simply put: Beckett didn't throw enough curveballs. Sox' catcher Kevin Cash noticed, and evidently so did the Yankees' hitters.

Of Beckett's 105 pitches, just 17 were curves. Considering the selection will never be the be-all, end-all in the hurler's repertoire, it might not seem like a big deal. But consider that all but three of the benders were tossed for strikes, with five them inducing outs (without a single hit coming off a curve) and you can get an idea regarding the pitch's importance.

"The biggest thing looking back is that we need to slow him down," Cash said. "Everything with Josh was power, power, power. The curveballs that he threw were good. I don't think one curve got hit. Looking back I think we should have thrown more curves."

So why point out these particulars when the overriding theme continues to be finding somebody to push the Sox into legitimate postseason conversation? Because this was a microcosm of the problem. Beckett has the stuff to be THAT guy. He has proven to be THAT guy in the past. And he might very well be THAT guy in the future. But he wasn't THAT guy Sunday night, when the Sox needed it the most. 

And it was all because of those bits and pieces of execution so many push to the side in favor of big-picture drama that the Sox could not make headway.

David Ortiz has done his best to carry the load at times this season, especially as of late. For example, he has gone out of his way to improve what weaknesses still linger in his game, such as hitting against left-handers. Entering the Yankees series, Ortiz had pulled his average against southpaws up over .200 by managing four hits in his previous five at-bats vs. lefties.

But Sunday night, with the bases loaded in the seventh and the Red Sox trailing by five, Ortiz couldn't quite figure out lefty Boone Logan, grounding out to second on a full count to end the threat. Considering how far the DH has come, it was forgivable failure, but still, when Ortiz is truly putting a team on his back like so many times before, a solution somehow needs to be uncovered in such situations.

"We have to keep on playing, we have no choice," Ortiz said. "We're in a short (slump) we have to walk out of. And we will."

There were other fixable problems that came up Sunday night. Hall throwing the ball away, allowing the Yankees to score their first run. ("I feel like I can make that nine times out of 10, or at least make a good throw and if he's safe, he's safe," the second baseman said.) Or Kevin Cash's errant pickoff attempt that paved the way for three more New York runs.

Would those have happened with the Red Sox roster positioned just so? Perhaps not. But Cash's miscue, for example, was made because he was trying to do something to get Beckett out of a pickle the pitcher had constructed mostly on his own.

None of that screams, "Get on my back, boys!" 

Now it's Lester's turn to take a whack at it. You can point to the fact the lefty is 0-4 with a 4.39 ERA since the All Star break, just like so many are jumping all over the inconsistencies of John Lackey or Daisuke Matsuzaka.

None of that matters. Somebody needs to step up for these Red Sox, and if they don't do it soon the opportunity will be a thing of the past.