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'Past Pugilistic Events' No Longer Matter To Rays, Red Sox

ALCS GAME 1: ON TBS, 8:37 p.m.

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Published: October 10, 2008

ST. PETERSBURG - The Rays and Red Sox have a long history of butting heads - artfully referred to Thursday as "past pugilistic events" by Tampa Bay manager Joe Maddon - but no one is expecting a renewal of those hostilities in the ALCS.

So you will not see James Shields drill Coco Crisp with a pitch should the two face off tonight. That's how the June 5 melee between the teams erupted, but too much is at stake now for that scene to be repeated in the name of machismo. In fact, Shields seemed amused that people expressed surprise after he mentioned he had chatted a bit with Crisp since then.

And Shields was hardly alone in predicting everything will be above-board as the teams battle to reach the World Series in the coming days.

"All that stuff, it doesn't matter," Maddon said. "Regardless of what people may want to write or think or project, it really doesn't matter. I know it's not going to be on my mind or any of our players' minds, I know it's not going to be on the Red Sox players' minds. This is the American League Championship Series. ... It's going to be about winning tonight's game."

Red Sox manager Terry Francona concurred, saying the postseason took precedence over settling grudges.

"The bad blood, I don't think anyone has even thought of it," Francona told reporters Wednesday in Boston. "That was a long time ago. This is the playoffs, and that really doesn't enter into it."

Then again, Francona wasn't with Boston when the Sox and Yankees brawled during the 2003 ALCS, with Pedro Martinez throwing Don Zimmer to the Fenway Park grass.

Maddon also pointed out that most of those around now weren't there for previous dust-ups between the Rays and Red Sox, from the celebrated showdown between Martinez and Gerald Williams in 2000 through the spring training 2006 altercation between Julian Tavarez and Joey Gathright.

"Those were when the Devil Rays were really struggling and the games had an entirely different tone to them," Maddon said. "We're a different team, we're a different organization now. We had the one incident this year, but that, to me, also is ancient history."

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