The curse has been broken – out of the ground, that is.
A pair of hardhats working at the new Yankee Stadium dropped a dime on the location of a buried Red Sox jersey.
Beantown-loving construction worker Gino Castignoli, who lives in The Bronx, confessed to The Post last week that he buried a Red Sox slugger David Ortiz jersey at the site last summer while working at the stadium.
After reading about the traitorous act in The Post, the two workers approached a construction manager and said they remembered Castignoli, who only worked at the Stadium one day, and thought they knew where he must have placed the shirt.
They led the manager to a service corridor near the site of the planned Legends Club restaurant, behind home plate and toward the third base side.
After the hardhats pointed to the spot, workers brought out jackhammers and dug furiously for five hours, creating a 2-foot- by-3-foot, gravel-filled pit in their search for the tainted threads.
They spotted the jersey at 3:25 p.m. and called Yankee brass. The cursed shirt was about two feet deep in cement.
“They absolutely pinpointed that if it was in the ground, that’s where it was,” team spokeswoman Alice McGillion said, as she let The Post inspect the now partly buried shirt.
But the team declined to identify its latest heroes.
Said McGillion: “The workers came forward this morning and said that they thought if there was a shirt buried, this is where it was” – on the stadium’s lowest level, behind where the field-level seats will be.
Truth be told, the jersey felt like a filthy rag – but the lettering of the word “RED” was plainly visible.
The Post first revealed Castignoli’s dirty deed Friday. Then yesterday, the Boston-loving boob said he hid it along the third-base line.
Yankee brass was initially in denial, a spokesman explained, because a quick review of the new Stadium’s pouring records determined that it just couldn’t be buried in that location.
After the discovery, the team ordered the work stopped – and left the shirt in the cement in preparation for an extraction ceremony today.
“We want to thank The Post for raising the issue,” McGillion said. “The [two] workers were terrific in coming forward. They wanted the shirt out of there.”
As it turns out, Castignoli, 46, has been in trouble before. The hulking mason once pleaded guilty to involvement in a $40 million illegal gambling operation with ties to the Gambino crime family.
He was busted in February 2002 during a roundup of mob-connected gambling dens, according to the Brooklyn DA’s Office.
But it was the betrayal of his borough that elicited Bronx cheers from many Yankee fans – including the new Boss, Hank Steinbrenner.
“I hope his coworkers kick the s- – – out of him,” said George’s boy, who now runs the team with his brother Hal.
Hank put no stock in talk of curses or in Castignoli’s cruel bid to hex the Yankees’ new $1.3 billion home.
A buried jersey, he reassured worried fans, means nothing.
“It’s a bunch of bull- – – -,” Hank said.
But Castignoli scoffed at the top Yankee honcho’s ready dismissal.
“So, then, why is he making such a big stink about it?” asked the would-be hexer. “If it’s no big deal, why not let it lay? Apparently, it’s bothering him.
“Tell Hank he can come meet me if he wants to try – and tell him to bring [catcher Jorge] Posada, because he’s the one Yankee I can’t stand.”
Meanwhile, Yankee fans attending last night’s game at Boston’s Fenway Park cheered the find.
“Dig it up, and get it out of there,” said Norberto Diaz, 35. “They should give the next guy $156 an hour to dig it up.”
Additional reporting byJennifer Fermino in Bostonand Matthew Nestel in NY