As theme songs go, “Sympathy for the Devil” seems appropriate for the 2007 New York Yankees.

Not that the team that Red Sox fans love to hate is going to get any.

Sympathy is in short supply for a team with a nearly $200-million payroll and a 19-23 record (going into last night’s game with Boston in the Bronx), even though the Yanks have suffered a devastating rash of injuries to their pitching staff.

Even with a power-laden lineup, it’s surprising the Bronx Bombers aren’t further below the .500 mark, considering their myriad mound woes.

The Yankees have, literally, been hamstrung when it comes to pitchers.

Chien-Ming Wang, who won 19 games last year, missed the first three weeks of this season because of a hamstring injury. Veteran Mike Mussina, a 15-game winner last year, also spent three weeks on the disabled list with the same injury. And it was a hamstring injury that put hard-hitting left fielder Hideki Matsui on the DL for 15 days last month.

As if that weren’t enough, highly regarded pitching prospect Phil Hughes, called up earlier than expected from Scranton/Wilkes-Barre to bolster the Yankees’ desperately thin staff, was working on a no-hitter in the seventh inning of his second major-league start when he had to leave the game with a hamstring pull that is expected to keep him out of action for four-to-six weeks.

Not surprisingly, the Yankees fired their strength and conditioning coach. But it’s not only muscle pulls and strains that have crippled the Yanks. Jeff Karstens is out for two months with a fractured fibula that occurred when Julio Lugo hit the first pitch of Karsten’s second career start off the rookie’s right leg on April 28 at Yankee Stadium. Another promising rookie, Darrell Rasner, had surgery Sunday to repair a broken finger he suffered on a hard, one-hopper back to the mound Saturday night against the Mets in Shea Stadium. He’s been placed on the 60-day disabled list.

And that’s still not all.

The biggest — and most expensive — disappointment has been Carl Pavano, who signed a four-year contract worth nearly $40 million in December 2004, and now is on the brink of undergoing “Tommy John” surgery after making a total of just 19 starts for New York.

With far more money than pitchers, and in danger of falling hopelessly behind in the race for a postseason playoff berth, it’s no surprise the Yankees were willing to ante up $10 million more than Boston for the services of 45-year-old Roger Clemens, who’s scheduled to pitch tomorrow night for Double-A Trenton, in preparation for his return to pinstripes Monday in Toronto.

While it’s hard, at least for Red Sox fans, to muster up any sympathy for the struggling Yankees, it’s similarly difficult to get all pumped up about the three-game series that opened last night in the Bronx, given that the Yanks were 10½ games behind Boston just 43 games into the season.

For those Sox fans afflicted with even a mild case of apathy, remember that the Red Sox started the 2002 season 30-13 and wound up 10½ games behind the Yanks. Two years ago, the Yankees opened 11-19, falling 6½ games behind Boston, but finished the 2005 season tied for the division lead. The Red Sox wound up as the wild-card team because they lost the season series with New York.

And will any Red Sox fan of a certain age ever forget 1978, when the Yankees, trailing Boston by 14 games on July 18, finished the regular season tied for first with the Sox, and then won the pennant in a one-game playoff at Fenway Park?

It’s also worth pointing out that the Yanks are scheduled to start three of their now-healthy best in this series against Boston. Wang got the nod last night, against knuckleballing Tim Wakefield. Tonight, it’s Mike Mussina against Julian Tavarez. Who do you like in that matchup? In the series finale tomorrow night, it’ll be ace lefty Andy Pettitte against the guy who likes to think he’s still Boston’s ace, Curt Schilling.

There is considerably more pressure on the Yanks than the Sox in this series. Fiery owner George Steinbrenner has been remarkably patient with his manager, Joe Torre, and general manager, Brian Cashman, but it’s highly doubtful that that will last if the Yanks fall even further behind Boston.

While Cashman probably deserves to go after spending so much money for so few wins, it would be unfortunate if Torre, who can’t exactly take the mound himself, were to lose his job.

Wait a second. Was that sympathy? There’ll be none of that. Not for these Yankees. Not yet, anyway. Not even with all the pitching problems they’ve had.

jdonald@projo.com