Forget the next three series. Being swept at home by the Redsocks is all we'd need to know.

We've touted the next nine games as a trial before the 2016 Yankee Supreme Court. Many of us have already issued our verdict: Guilty as charged. We think this wretched team would be better off losing - collapsing, exploding, launching a front office civil war and then maybe starting over... sort of the fan version of Brexit. Trouble is, we won't deal with the real problem: We won't get a new owner.

After last night, I need no 10-game litmus test.

If we're swept by Boston at home, bang the gavel. The season is over, and like they say in the car ads: Everything must go!

For weeks now, I've hoped for a reason - some reason - to believe in this team. But if Boston sweeps us at home, forget it. This wouldn't be a case of us going to Fenway and sweeping them. We'd just go there and face yet another pounding. We are in Year IV of the Great Barf - it might last several more seasons - and if Boston sweeps us at home, it will be emblematic of our current status. We will stand naked before the NY media: No longer viewed as a good team going through a tough stretch... but a full-blown, Stage 4 algae bloom, and the most humane act is a chlorine shock or - maybe, better - just to pull the plug on this sorry mess.

Last night in the fifth, after watching another steaming Pineda meltdown, I was even ready to douse John and Suzyn - who fumed between in-game ads over the 5-0 debacle. Then, suddenly, we rallied for three runs, offering hope for one of those 1990s, spirit-lifting comebacks that once epitomized a Yankee-Redsocks game. Could it happen? I had to watch. So we went down like lambs, 1-for-10, swinging on first pitches and striking out on full counts. Horrible.

Nothing can fix this team. Nothing suggests a season of destiny.

Still... there is a special dung heap in hell, if we're swept at home by Boston...