Nationals’ Cade Cavalli, Red Sox’s Willson Contreras suspended after benches-clearing incident

Major League Baseball has suspended four players involved in a benches-clearing fracas between the Washington Nationals and Boston Red Sox. On Thursday, the league announced that pitcher Cade Cavalli of the Nationals and first baseman Willson Contreras of the Red Sox have been suspended for seven games apiece. Nationals pitcher Miles Mikolas has been suspended for five games, and Boston outfielder Nate Eaton received a three-game suspension. All four players have also been fined an undisclosed amount. The suspensions are pending appeal. 

Tempers flared and benches cleared in Boston on Tuesday evening during an 8-1 Nationals win over the Red Sox. It was the bottom of the fourth inning when Cavalli dropped in a nice breaking ball for a called strike three. Cavalli, who would later apologize for his words, could be heard yelling, “Sit down, boy!” The strikeout victim, Contreras, was none too pleased with it. He could be seen saying, “Are you talking to me?”

Contreras approached the mound, and then the benches cleared for a minor scuffle in which Contreras appeared to try to throw his helmet in Cavalli’s direction. 

Contreras was ejected for the second straight game. Eaton and Chad Tracy, Boston’s interim manager, were also given the heave-ho. On the Nationals’ end, Mikolas, a starting pitcher on an off day, was the only player ejected.

Contreras has publicly spoken about how much the devastating earthquakes in his home country of Venezuela have affected his psyche in recent days. He was involved in a benches-clearing incident last Friday and was tossed on consecutive nights. He also hit a home run and yelled “Venezuela!” and was seen crying in the dugout. 

In the other dugout on Tuesday, Cavalli ended up having quite a night. In seven innings, he gave up just one run on one hit with 13 strikeouts. 

On Wednesday, Cavalli met with Nationals president of baseball operations Paul Toboni about the incident and also apologized for his choice of words. Via The Athletic, Cavalli said: 

“Extremely torn up about the way that things were perceived. Obviously, there was no ill intention behind that. My teammates know me, my family knows me, this organization knows me. I couldn’t sleep because of it. It hurt my heart, knowing that, if there’s a 13 year old black kid in DC that sees that, that looked up to me, thinks that he perceived it in a way that wasn’t intended in the way that it came out, that he’s not looking up to me anymore. That hurts my heart. It’s really tough. I’ve learned a lot. … The intention was perceived different than what my heart is and who I am as a person, my character.

“There’s a history behind that word, and that’s just something that, like, as a competitor, like in football or basketball, playing whiffle ball with my brother, like, just, you don’t understand it, and then it gets perceived in a way that was not my intention. You learn from that, and it’ll never happen again.”

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Toboni also spoke to reporters and said that Cavalli had something of a sleepless night after the game on account of “the feedback that he was receiving regarding his choice of words last night.”