Curse of the Bambino Red Sox were there. Yankee fans also taunted the Red Sox with signs saying "1918!", "CURSE OF THE BAMBINO", pictures of Babe Ruth, and wearing "1918!" T-shirts each time they were at the Stadium. Before Ruth left Boston, the Red Sox had won five of the first fifteen World Series, with Ruth pitching for the and championship teams (he was with the Sox for the 1915 World Series but the manager used him only once, as a pinch-hitter, and he did not pitch). The Yankees had not played in any World Series up to that time. In the 84 years
Babe Ruth legal difficulties to be straightened out as Ruth was supposed to remain at the school until he turned 21. The train journey to spring training in Fayetteville, North Carolina, in early March was likely Ruth's first outside the Baltimore area. The rookie ballplayer was the subject of various pranks by the veterans, who were probably also the source of his famous nickname. There are various accounts of how Ruth came to be called Babe, but most center on his being referred to as "Dunnie's babe" or a variant. "Babe" was at that time a common nickname in baseball, with perhaps