‘It could awaken the spirits’

Don’t count the Yankees out of the World Series still: they still have the Sultan of Swat.

Yankees fans have spent decades leaving “offerings” at Babe Ruth’s grave: everything from baseballs to baseball cards, sunflower seeds to bottles of whiskey in hopes of bringing luck to the Bronx Bombers.

With the Yankees battling the Los Angeles Dodgers in the Fall Classic, they are stepping up their game.

“I thought I’d go say hi and maybe I could wake up the spirits,” superfan Pete Lombardo said Monday at Gate of Heaven Cemetery in Westchester County, decked out in full Ruth regalia with his wife and 22-month-old daughter. . “Hopefully Ruth will go to the Bronx and say, ‘What’s up, guys?’

“I was joking along the way, saying I would sacrifice my firstborn for the Yankees to win the World Series,” Lombardo said, looking at his little boy. “Alright?”

The Bambino’s grave has long been something of a mecca for the Yankee faithful.

The Yankees legend, who died in 1948, has since cast a spell on the team’s fan base, most notably with a now-defunct Curse of the Bambino that supposedly kept the hated Red Sox away from baseball’s promised land for decades.

The Sox traded Ruth to the Yankees in 1919 for cash, one of the most lopsided trades in baseball history that launched the Yankee dynasty and propelled them to become the best team in the game. The Sox won the World Series with Ruth in 1918, but the trade marked the beginning of a drought that lasted decades.

The “curse” ended when the Sox finally beat the Bombers in 2004, but fans aren’t giving up.

In recent days, the grave has been adorned with more than 50 baseballs, one reading “Go Yankees 2024,” a tall Budweiser can, an airline-sized bottle of Jack Daniels, a baseball cap the Yankees, a mini batting ball. helmet, an old leather baseball glove, two American flags and a handful of Mass cards.

Also in the mix is ​​a mini pumpkin with “go Yankees” written on it, a handful of rocks and pennies, and a bag full of David sunflower seeds, a favorite gift among baseball players.

“You have to see my office!” Lombardo said.

The 36-year-old father, a season ticket holder and data science technician at Northwell Health in Farmington, said he took the day off for the trip and got his family together by including a trip to the pumpkin patch at north of the state.

“This is my first time here,” he said. “I always wanted to come. I thought it was the perfect day to come.

“Babe Ruth is a legend,” Lombardo added. “Every time I’m in Monument Park I have to rub his head. You know, the Babe Ruth monument? Yes, he is the best Yankee that ever lived.”

Turning to his daughter Elizabeth, he asked, “Can you say, come on Yankees?”

The girl clenched her fist.