Boston Red Sox
Willson Contreras charged the mound after Nationals righty Cade Cavalli shouted something at him after a strikeout.
Willson Contreras went after Washington righty Cade Cavalli on Tuesday. Danielle Parhizkaran/The Boston Globe
It was fight night at Fenway Park on Tuesday.
Emotions boiled over between the Red Sox and Nationals in the fourth inning, with Boston first baseman Willson Contreras at the center of the kerfuffle.
With Boston up, 1-0, in the fourth, Contreras was called out on strikes off a sweeper delivered by Washington starter Cade Cavalli. Cavalli then shouted something in Contreras’ direction after the strikeout, which the veteran infielder quickly picked up on.
As he was walking back to the dugout, Contreras paused and appeared to ask Cavalli if he was shouting at him. As the temperature started to rise with Contreras and Cavalli exchanging words, both dugouts emptied.
Things ratcheted up after Contreras shook loose from Washington catcher Keibert Ruiz and ran toward the mass of Red Sox and Nationals players gathered in the middle of the diamond.
Contreras wasn’t able to get to his intended target in Cavalli, but attempted to spike his helmet toward the Nationals righty — only for it to instead hit Washington first baseman Andrés Chaparro.
In total, three players were ejected — Contreras, Nationals righty Miles Mikolas, and Red Sox outfielder Nate Eaton, who wasn’t even in the game on Tuesday night. Red Sox interim manager Chad Tracy was also ejected after arguing with the umpires after the scrum started to dissipate.
It’s been an eventful couple of days for Contreras, who admitted on Monday that he’s running through plenty of emotions in the tragic aftermath of devastating earthquakes that impacted his native country of Venezuela.
On Monday, cameras captured Contreras crying in the Red Sox dugout after clubbing a three-run homer against the Nationals — with the veteran later ejected in the second inning for mocking a check-swing ruling from first base umpire Nic Lantz by tapping his helmet as a signal for an ABS challenge.
“It’s not easy to hide. It’s not easy just to show up and play with everything that’s going on in my country,” Contreras said after Monday’s win. “I wasn’t feeling good the whole day. I was kind of down, sad. And I hit a homer. Of course, I tried to help [spark] my dugout. But the first thing that I said was ‘Venezuela.’ That was the first thing that came out of my mouth.”
Conor Ryan is a staff writer covering the Bruins, Celtics, Patriots, and Red Sox for Boston.com, a role he has held since 2023.
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