BOSTON — Washington Nationals starter Cade Cavalli said on Wednesday morning that he felt terrible for his word choice in Tuesday night’s win over the Boston Red Sox and did not know that his phrasing — telling Willson Contreras to “sit down, boy” after a strikeout, which incited a scuffle that led to four ejections — had historically racist connotations.Cavalli promised that he would never use that phrasing again.“I’m extremely torn up about the way that things were perceived,” Cavalli said. “Obviously, there was no ill intention behind that. It hurt my heart, knowing that, if there’s a 13-year-old Black kid in D.C. that sees that — that looked up to me and thinks that he perceived it in a way that wasn’t intended the way that it came out, and then 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.”Nationals president of baseball operations Paul Toboni and manager Blake Butera spoke to Cavalli on Wednesday morning and said there would be no discipline from the team because they did not believe Cavalli’s intentions were, in Toboni’s words, to “demean someone in some racial way.”Toboni and Butera have not yet addressed the rest of the team, given that they had just arrived at the park when Toboni addressed reporters, though that could change.Neither Cavalli nor Butera had reached out to Contreras either, though Cavalli said he hopes that Contreras hears his message.“There’s a history behind that word, and that’s just something that as a competitor, like in football or basketball, playing Wiffle ball with my brother, you don’t understand it,” Cavalli said. “And then it gets perceived in a way that was not my intention, and then you learn from that. It’ll never happen again.”Toboni acknowledged that the perception mattered, even if the intent wasn’t there.“It doesn’t matter if your intent is OK,” Toboni said. “Because the bottom line is, there are folks around Washington, D.C., and around the country that might receive it differently than you receive it.”In the postgame clubhouse on Tuesday night, Cavalli had not initially included the word “boy” in recounting what he said. Chad Tracy, Boston’s interim manager, said it was clear what Cavalli had said “at the top of (his) lungs.”Tracy addressed the matter with reporters before Wednesday’s game, as well. Asked if he thought Cavalli should be punished by MLB for the incident, he deferred to the league.“I’m going to let them decide that,” Tracy said. “I’ll stick with what I said last night. It was just when it happened, it was like ‘Whoa,’ when you heard that. So I’m hopeful that they will. There’s plenty more camera angles and things here than there is in Triple A to assess and watch every angle of what happened.”Contreras did not speak to the media before Wednesday’s game and did not elaborate on the incident Tuesday night.“Whatever happened there happened,” Contreras said after Tuesday’s game. “I will not be making any comments about (what Cavalli said). I feel like it’s going to go against me.”While the veteran first baseman did not elaborate on his role in the scuffle, his manager added more context on Wednesday.“I don’t think it was that Willson just decided to walk out there for no reason to have a conversation,” Tracy said. “So that was my only take on it and I’ll stick by it.”