WILLIAMS GUIDES GUARDIANS

CLEVELAND (AP) — Gavin Williams settled down after a choppy start and pitched seven solid innings as the Cleveland Guardians beat the Washington Nationals 3-2 on Wednesday to salvage the finale of a three-game series.

Williams (8-3) allowed one run and only three hits — all in the first three innings. The right-hander needed 24 pitches to get out of the first and then threw just 19 combined from the fourth through the sixth. He retired his final 13 batters.

Tim Herrin worked the eighth and Cade Smith gave up a run in the ninth before striking out two with the tying run at second for his MLB-leading 19th save.

Rookie Travis Bazzana had two doubles and José Ramírez drove in a run for Cleveland, which was outscored 16-5 in the first two games.

Washington’s James Wood went 8 for 12 in the series with two homers, three RBIs and five runs.

Unable to score more than three runs in any of their last seven games, the Guardians finally strung hits together in the fifth to take a 3-1 lead. They got some help as Nationals third baseman Curtis Mead couldn’t handle Austin Hedges’ hard-hit leadoff grounder for an error.

Ramírez hit a sacrifice fly off Miles Mikolas (1-4) and rookie Chase DeLauter and Angel Martinez delivered RBI singles off Richard Lovelady.

Wood came in on a two-day tear against the Guardians and opened the third with a double. He advanced on a groundout and scored when CJ Abrams ripped a double into the right-field corner.

CUBS SNAP 10-GAME SKID

PITTSBURGH (AP) — Ian Happ hit a tiebreaking three-run home run and drove in five runs on Wednesday night while playing in his hometown as the Chicago Cubs ended their 10-game losing streak with a 10-4 victory over the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Happ’s three-run shot snapped a 4-4 tie and started a six-run inning that helped the Cubs get their first win since May 15. Pinch-hitter Michael Conforto hit a two-run home run later in the inning to extend the lead to 10-4.

Happ also hit a two-run single in the first inning to open the scoring and has reached base in each of his last 40 games in Pittsburgh. He was one of five Cubs with two hits.

Brandon Lowe hit a three-run homer for the Pirates and rookie Konnor Griffin had a solo blast that drew the Pittsburgh into a 4-4 tie in the fourth inning.

Chicago is just the second team in major league history to have two 10-game winning streaks and a 10-game losing streak in the same season, along with the 2017 Los Angeles Dodgers.

Jacob Webb (1-1) struck out the side in order in the sixth. Yohan Ramirez (2-2), who allowed Happ’s home run, was charged with four runs in 1/3 inning.

Neither starter factored in the decision as Cubs veteran Jameson Taillon and Pirates rookie Bubba Chandler both allowed four runs in five innings. Taillon has lost his four previous starts. Chandler has gone seven starts since his only win of the season.

Bryan Reynolds had three hits for the Pirates, who had won their previous three games.

Wednesday marked the 2,000th regular-season game played at PNC Park, which opened in 2001. The Pirates have a 1,003-996-1 record there.

UNION FIRES FIRST SHOTS

NEW YORK (AP) — Baseball players fired the opening salvo Wednesday in what is expected to be long and contentious labor negotiations, asking for expanded free agency and salary arbitration rights along with almost doubling the major league minimum and increasing the money high-revenue teams share with the less-wealthy clubs.

A day before Major League Baseball is expected to make a salary cap proposal, the union outlined its initial economic proposals during a bargaining session at the players’ association office in Manhattan. It included what it called a “competitive integrity tax” that would penalize teams dropping below a payroll floor and called for the luxury tax threshold to rise to $300 million next year.

Baseball’s labor contract expires Dec. 1 and MLB is expected to institute a lockout, management’s equivalent of a strike under federal labor law. Players have vowed they never will accept a salary cap.

“Attendance, viewership, interest — by any measure you want to use, our game is moving in a positive direction,” Baltimore pitcher Chris Bassitt, a member of the union’s eight-man executive subcommittee, said in a statement. “We’ve put forward proposals designed to continue that trend. Support, incentivize, and reward clubs who are committed to competing, especially small-market clubs. Compensate players fairly for the work they are doing.”

NO SEC CUPCAKES

DESTIN, Fla. (AP) — The Southeastern Conference is eliminating “cupcake weekend.”

The league’s athletic directors voted at their annual spring meetings for everyone to play conference games on the second-to-last week of the regular season beginning in 2027.

It means no more Football Championship Subdivision or lower-tier Football Bowl Subdivision opponents before those rivalry games that typically take place during the final week of the season.

“That’s the end of cupcake weekend,” SEC commissioner Greg Sankey said. “We never got that one sponsored, though.”

SEC decision-makers have discussed dumping those late-season payday matchups for months. The conference expanded to a nine-game league schedule beginning in 2026, prompting the need for more significant matchups in late November.

“It’s nine conference games and a recognition that you’re populating more weekends,” Sankey said. “And so you really cannot have odd numbers of open or non-conference dates later in the season because then that has a backward domino effect in where you place games early. We ran into some of that in the ’26 season.”

Only four SEC teams – Alabama, Auburn, Mississippi and Mississippi State – have such games set for this season.