Tanaka’s struggles concern Hal

As long as Masahiro Tanaka tells the Yankees he is healthy, managing general partner Hal Steinbrenner believes the staff ace will emerge from the three-game pitching funk he is in. However, Steinbrenner isn’t shrugging off the right-hander’s recent performances.

“We’ll see. The one thing about Tanaka is he is a seasoned veteran, and sometimes these seasoned veterans tend to start off a little bit slower. CC [Sabathia] has been that way in the past some years. And then they get better and better,’’ Steinbrenner said Wednesday in Manhattan, where MLB owners met. “But look, I’m not going to say it’s not a concern, what we’ve seen. But he’s a professional. He’s a veteran. Been around a lot of years. There’s no complaints of injury. There’s no complaints of anything, physical-wise. So you’ve got to figure it’s going to come.’’

A good place for that to start is Saturday against the Rays in St. Petersburg, Fla., because the 28-year-old Tanaka’s last three outings haven’t been good. Wednesday, in a Kauffman Stadium bullpen session that was supervised by pitching coach Larry Rothschild, Tanaka worked on keeping the left side of his body from flying open.

In Tanaka’s past three starts, against the Blue Jays, Reds and Astros, he has worked 15 innings, allowed 25 hits and has a bloated 9.00 ERA.

The Yankees have their fingers firmly crossed that Sunday night, when the Astros dropped eight runs and seven hits (four homers) on him in 1 2/3 innings, was the low point.

That it came in front of the Yankees retiring Derek Jeter’s No. 2 especially stung Tanaka.

“I feel like I was more disappointed than usual. It was a really special day and I thought it was one of those games that you have to do really well. Not being able to give out a strong performance on that day I feel bad and disappointed,’’ said Tanaka, who is 5-2 with a 5.80 ERA in eight starts. “That’s what I think looking back on that day.’’