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KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Willy Adames had been chatting up the Royals fans behind the Milwaukee dugout all game, the good-natured ribbing carrying on as the Brewers jumped out to a two-run lead and Kansas City battled back to take its own two-run lead to the ninth.

With two outs and a pair of runners aboard, Adames found himself standing in the on-deck circle with the game on the line.

“They told me they wanted me to hit a three-run homer,” Adames would say later, “and I was like, ‘I got you.'”

Adames proceeded to drill an 83 mph curveball from Royals closer James McArthur into the left-field bullpen, sending Milwaukee to a 6-5 win Tuesday night and leaving those Kansas City fans mock-worshipping him as he returned to the dugout.

“It was really priceless,” said Brewers manager Pat Murphy, who had watched the called shot scene unfold. “It was really cool.”

Jared Koenig (3-1) earned the win for Milwaukee, getting Hunter Renfroe to ground out to end the seventh and then surviving a scoreless eighth. Trevor Megill breezed through the ninth to earn his third save in three tries.

Vinnie Pasquantino drove in three runs for Kansas City. Salvador Perez and Kyle Isbel also drove in runs.

“That one stings,” Royals manager Matt Quatraro said, “but we’ve done that to other people as well.”

Rhys Hoskins and Joey Ortiz crushed back-to-back homers off Royals starter Seth Lugo in the second inning, but that was all the offense the Brewers could muster until the seventh, when they managed to coax another run across.

They squandered a chance to draw closer when Angel Zerpa struck out Gary Sanchez to strand a pair later in the seventh, then missed another opportunity in the eighth, when John Schreiber fanned Oliver Dunn to leave two more runners aboard.

The Brewers didn’t waste their final opportunity in the ninth.

McArthur (1-2) had retired the first two batters when William Contreras, on a full-count pitch, began the comeback with a double just inside the left-field foul line. Sanchez followed with a walk before Adames walked confidently to the plate.

“He’s carrying on with [the fans] during Gary’s at-bat, and he’s telling them — they’re Kansas City fans — he’s telling them, ‘One more ball,'” Murphy said. “Then he goes back to them and goes, ‘Here we go.'”

There it went, right into the left-field bullpen.

It wasn’t exactly on par Babe Ruth’s called shot — there’s a big difference between a regular-season game the first week of May and Game 3 of the 1932 World Series, when the Hall of Famer famously pointed toward deep center field at Wrigley Field, then homered to that exact spot to help the Yankees beat the Cubs 7-5.

Still, it was the kind of stuff certain to go down in Brewers lore.

“Oh my God, that was the coolest thing I ever done,” said Adames, who even signed some balls for those Kansas City fans. “You know, sometimes the fans will be very hard, but these guys here, they were amazing. They were having a good time. Like, all my at-bats, we were chatting, and then the last one was obviously the most fun.”

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Sources: FBI probes MLBPA business partnership

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Sources: FBI probes MLBPA business partnership

FBI agents have reached out to major league baseball players about their knowledge of financial dealings related to a multibillion-dollar group-licensing firm started and owned, in part, by their union and the NFL Players Association, multiple sources with knowledge of the investigation told ESPN.

The sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said they had direct knowledge of law enforcement calls to at least three players involved in union leadership in recent days. The sources said the players are not targets of the investigation.

According to the sources, law enforcement agents inquired about money related to OneTeam Partners, established in 2019 by the NFLPA, MLBPA and a private-equity partner, RedBird Capital, and used to strike media deals and monetize athletes’ name, image and likeness.

In a statement, OneTeam said it is “aware of an ongoing investigation of allegations concerning our partners. We want to emphasize that OneTeam is not the subject of the investigation and has not been accused of any wrongdoing in any way. OneTeam is fully committed to cooperating with the investigation.”

Union executives said they have not been contacted by federal agents. “If the MLBPA is contacted by the government, we intend to cooperate fully with any investigation,” the MLBPA said Friday in a statement to ESPN. Player leadership has retained separate legal counsel outside of the union, sources said.

Multiple sources said the investigation is being run out of the Eastern District of New York, whose office is based in Brooklyn. A senior FBI official declined to comment Friday, and a spokesperson with the Eastern District declined to confirm the investigation.

The OneTeam partnership has become a major financial boon for both associations and has grown in valuation as it added the players’ unions of women’s basketball, men’s and women’s soccer, and other sports and college athletes to its portfolio. OneTeam was valued at $1.9 billion in 2022, when RedBird Capital sold its 40% stake to three other investment firms.

The MLBPA’s and NFLPA’s relationships with OneTeam have come under scrutiny before. In late 2024, an anonymous unfair labor practices complaint was filed with the National Labor Relations Board, alleging “nepotism, corruption, mismanagement” at the MLBPA.

In December, the NFLPA’s outside counsel, Richard Smith, launched an audit into whether OneTeam had granted equity options to the executive directors of unions that the company represents, including the MLBPA. In its statement, OneTeam said it “remains steadfast in our commitment to following the best business practices, as has already been determined by the independent audit conducted earlier this year. … We remain dedicated to upholding the highest standards of integrity and transparency in all that we do.”

The NLRB complaint against the MLBPA alleges that the union’s executive director, Tony Clark, “improperly gave himself & other executives equity” in OneTeam and made “inadequate disclosures” about the partnership in annual union filings.

The union has previously denied the allegations against Clark, 52. He was hired as the MLBPA’s director of player relations after 15 seasons as a player and ascended to executive director following the death of his predecessor, Michael Weiner, in 2013. According to an LM-30 federal labor union disclosure he filed last year, Clark holds a seat on the OneTeam board.

Union finances have improved significantly under Clark’s leadership, due in part to proceeds from OneTeam. In 2020-24, the partnership paid the MLBPA nearly $160 million, according to the union’s annual LM-2 reports. In 2024, the union received $44.5 million from OneTeam.

The reports don’t detail how much of the OneTeam windfall was distributed to players. The MLBPA has more than $353 million in total assets, the highest fiscal-year-end figure in its history, according to the documents.

According to the MLBPA’s most recent filing, the union paid Clark $3.5 million in 2024.

The NFLPA’s audit of OneTeam was completed in March and found that the NFLPA’s role as part of OneTeam was “in compliance with best governance practices,” a source with firsthand knowledge said.

An NFLPA spokesperson declined comment Friday.

According to its LM-2s, OneTeam paid the NFLPA $422.8 million in the past five years. The NFLPA’s total assets are nearly $1.4 billion, with almost $240 million in cash, according to the union’s filings.

DeMaurice Smith, the former NFLPA leader who co-founded OneTeam with Clark, left the union in 2023 and was replaced on the partnership’s board by the union’s new executive director, Lloyd Howell Jr.

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Jays put Santander on IL with shoulder injury

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Jays put Santander on IL with shoulder injury

TORONTO — The Blue Jays put slugger Anthony Santander on the 10-day injured list Friday because of left shoulder inflammation and recalled outfielder Alan Roden from Triple-A Buffalo.

Santander is batting .179 with six home runs and 18 RBI in 50 games. The veteran switch hitter has missed a handful of games because of left hip and left shoulder soreness over the past three weeks.

Santander signed a $92.5 million, five-year contract with Toronto in January after eight seasons with Baltimore. He hit a career-best 44 home runs for the Orioles last season.

The outfielder had an MRI after Thursday’s 12-0 win over the Athletics, when he was 0 for 2 with two strikeouts and two walks, Blue Jays manager John Schneider said. The team was still determining whether the next steps would include a cortisone injection or rehabilitation, the manager said.

“I think it just got to the point to where it was bothering him,” Schneider said before Friday’s game against the Athletics. “You can’t really put the work that you want to put in volume-wise, and we just think it’s best for him right now.”

Roden rejoins the Blue Jays after batting .178 with one home run and five RBI in 28 games for Toronto earlier this season, his first in the majors. Roden hit .361 with three homers and 12 RBI in 18 games at Buffalo after being sent down May 7.

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Twins reinstate Buxton after 11-game absence

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Twins reinstate Buxton after 11-game absence

SEATTLE — The Minnesota Twins reinstated center fielder Byron Buxton from the seven-day concussion injured list Friday before beginning a three-game series in Seattle, two weeks after he collided with shortstop Carlos Correa in pursuit of a shallow fly ball.

Buxton missed 11 games after the collision, which also sent Correa into the concussion protocol. Correa needed only the minimum seven-day stay on the injured list and missed five games.

To make room for Buxton, outfielder Carson McCusker was sent back to Triple-A St. Paul. Buxton was batting .261 with an .834 OPS and 18 extra-base hits, including 10 homers, before he was hurt. He also had 33 runs, 27 RBIs and 8 steals in his first 41 games.

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