Red Sox Brawls

Boston.com has a great 17-page slide show & captions of the best Red Sox brawls over the years. The 2003 ALCS brawl with the Yankees, resulting in Pedro Martinez throwing a deranged Don Zimmer to the ground tops my list, followed closely by the Varitek/A-Rod scrum.

See slide show.

Who could ever forget Pedro Martinez's discarding of Yankees coach Don Zimmer? In the fourth inning of Game 3 of the 2003 ALCS Roger Clemens threw a high and inside pitch at Manny Ramirez, emptying the benches. An enraged Zimmer charged Martinez as both dugouts cleared.

The Yankees went on to beat the Red Sox in the game, 4-3, in a series they eventually won in seven games. Zimmer left Fenway that day in an ambulance, and offered a tearful apology for his behavior the next day.

The image that appears on countless computer screen-savers across New England: Sox catcher Jason Varitek feeds Yankees star Alex Rodriguez a glove sandwich that led to a raucous brawl during a pivotal July 2004 contest between the Yanks and Sox, a game Boston rallied to win on Bill Mueller's home run off Yankees closer Mariano Rivera.