NEW YORK — Thinking about taking a piece of Yankee Stadium with you during the next few days of the final homestand at the House that Ruth Built? Devising an elaborate, secretive plan to make off with something from the Stadium that you hope to one day tell your friends and family about?
Then the Yankees have three words for you: Don't try it.
Fans who steal Yankee Stadium property will be dealt with to the fullest extent of the law, but it doesn't stop there. Just attempting to take something will get you in extremely hot water.
Anyone caught with their finger even reaching into the proverbial cookie jar for a keepsake memento could find themselves getting a little tap on the shoulder from someone representing a number of law enforcement agencies – and subsequently arrested.
"It's not worth it," Yankees media relations director Jason Zillo said yesterday. "There's going to be too many enforcement agencies here, really, to get away with anything."
Knowing there are some fans attending this week's game who might've been plotting a scheme to leave with something, the Yankees have been fine-tuning their security detail for months. Uniformed NYPD personnel and plainclothes officers are on the prowl to keep fans in check.
The Yankees have the full cooperation of the NYPD, federal and state agencies, and the Bronx district attorney's office in helping secure the facility. Major League Baseball has made some of its security staff available. There even will be mounted police guarding the field once the final out is recorded Sunday.
The Yankees want to get the word out with hopes that it will deter anyone from deciding to try to steal a plate, chair back, toilet bowl seat or anything else. In the past, some people who were arrested for theft of Stadium property have claimed they didn't know doing so was illegal and that they could be prosecuted.
In order to make people aware of the consequences associated with any thievery, the Yankees will make periodic announcements during the rest of the homestand. Public-address announcer Jim Hall did just that before the start of the bottom of the fourth inning last night.
"This is like a big museum and it's like the closing night," Zillo said. "You have artifacts and things that cannot be replaced. It's like the MasterCard commercial, you know. There's no value on some of the things that are here."
The Yankees know that not everyone is out to swipe something to add to their personal memorabilia collection. Their goal is simply to keep the final handful of games as uneventful as possible.
"The great majority of fans that come here these last six days are here just to enjoy and be part of the festivities, the celebration," Zillo said. "And we don't want a select few to ruin that feeling. We don't want their last experience to be anything but positive at Yankee Stadium."