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Joe Maddon Uses Baseball to Share His Thoughts With Nationals Fan (Photo)

Few people can compete with well-known Washington, D.C. heckler Robin Ficker in the age-old art of trash talking. But manager Joe Maddon gave it his best shot Thursday night when his Tampa Bay Rays visited the nation's capital to play the Washington Nationals.

Ficker, who has gained local fame in D.C. for being a master at the art of heckling, was picking away at the Rays' most recent blunder in Joel Peralta's pine tar-related ejection. According to nearby fellow spectators, Ficker was shouting, "Check for pine tar," and, "See Maddon, it can be done without pine tar."

So, Maddon decided to take the high road and refrain from trash talking back.

Instead, he wrote out his retaliation on a baseball and tossed it to Ficker.

The message on the ball read, "stick up for those you care about," and was fittingly smeared in pine tar. That ought to shut Ficker up — at least until the next meeting between the two.

Picture Courtesy of @ChanningPejic