Red Sox third baseman Alex Bregman leaves game with right quad tightness

BOSTON (AP) — Red Sox third baseman Alex Bregman was removed in the fifth inning of Friday’s doubleheader opener against the Baltimore Orioles because of right quadriceps tightness and hopes he doesn't go on the injured list.

“I felt my quad grab so I didn’t continue running to second base," Bregman said after Boston's 19-5 win. “I stopped and came back to the bag so I wouldn’t make it any worse.”

A two-time World Series winner who spent the first nine seasons of his big league career with the Houston, Bregman signed a $120 million, three-year contract with Boston in February and is hitting .299 with 11 home runs and 35 RBIs.

“I knew I needed to come out and see the trainer,” Bregman said. “We’ll know a lot more tomorrow after sleeping and seeing how it presents in the morning. All of my strength is still there, which is good.”

In 2021, Bregman was sidelined between June 16 and Aug. 21 with a left quadriceps strain.

“I’m actually positive based off what I originally thought,” Bregman said.

Nick Sogard started at second in the doubleheader nightcap. Manger Alex Cora also mentioned Ceddanne Rafaela, Nick Sogard and Abraham Toro as third base candidates but did not include Rafael Devers as a possible option. Devers was moved off third base – his primary position during the first eight seasons of his big league career – after Boston signed Bregman.

Red Sox management approached Devers about playing first base after Triston Casas injured the patellar tendon in his left knee on May 2 but Devers told the club that he wasn’t interested in changing positions for the second time since the start of spring training.

AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb

Boston Red Sox's Alex Bregman heads for the dugout after injuring himself on a single against the Baltimore Orioles during the fifth inning in the first baseball game of a doubleheader Friday, May 23, 2025, at Fenway Park in Boston. (AP Photo/Winslow Townson)

Boston Red Sox manager Alex Cora puts his hand on the shoulder of Alex Bregman as he leaves the game after injuring himself running out a single against the Baltimore Orioles during the fifth inning in the first baseball game of a doubleheader Friday, May 23, 2025, at Fenway Park in Boston. (AP Photo/Winslow Townson)

Boston Red Sox's Alex Bregman bends over before leaving the game after injuring himself on a single against the Baltimore Orioles during the fifth inning in the first baseball game of a doubleheader Friday, May 23, 2025, at Fenway Park in Boston. (AP Photo/Winslow Townson)

Boston Red Sox pitcher Aroldis Chapman, left, celebrates with Alex Bregman, right, after defeating the New York Mets in a baseball game at Fenway Park, Monday, May 19, 2025, in Boston. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

Boston Red Sox's Alex Bregman, left, celebrates after his double in the third inning of a baseball game against the New York Mets at Fenway Park, Monday, May 19, 2025, in Boston. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

Boston Red Sox's Alex Bregman is led off the field by manager Alex Cora after injuringf himself on a single during the fifth inning against the Baltimore Orioles in the first baseball game of a doubleheader Friday, May 23, 2025, at Fenway Park in Boston. (AP Photo/Winslow Townson)

BERLIN (AP) — European leaders are expected to cement support for Ukraine Monday as it faces Washington’s pressure to swiftly accept a U.S.-brokered peace deal.

After Sunday’s talks in Berlin between U.S. envoys and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Ukrainian and European officials are set to continue a series of meetings in an effort to secure the continent’s peace and security in the face of an increasingly assertive Russia.

Zelenskyy sat down Sunday with U.S. President Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner in the German federal chancellery in the hopes of bringing the nearly four-year war to a close.

Washington has tried for months to navigate the demands of each side as Trump presses for a swift end to Russia’s war and grows increasingly exasperated by delays. The search for possible compromises has run into major obstacles, including control of Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, which is mostly occupied by Russian forces.

The U.S. government late Sunday said in a social media post on Witkoff’s account after the five-hour meeting that “a lot of progress was made.”

Earlier in the day, Zelenskyy voiced readiness to drop his country’s bid to join NATO if the U.S. and other Western nations give Kyiv security guarantees similar to those offered to NATO members. But Ukraine continued to reject the U.S. push for ceding territory to Russia.

Putin wants Ukraine to withdraw its forces from the part of the Donetsk region still under its control among the key conditions for peace.

The Russian president also has cast Ukraine’s bid to join NATO as a major threat to Moscow’s security and a reason for launching the full-scale invasion in February 2022. The Kremlin has demanded that Ukraine renounce the bid for alliance membership as part of any prospective peace settlement.

Zelenskyy emphasized that any Western security assurances would need to be legally binding and supported by the U.S. Congress.

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who has spearheaded European efforts to support Ukraine alongside French President Emmanuel Macron and U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer, said Saturday that “the decades of the ‘Pax Americana’ are largely over for us in Europe and for us in Germany as well.”

“Pax Americana” refers to the U.S.’s postwar dominance as a superpower that has brought relative peace to the globe.

Merz warned that Putin’s aim is “a fundamental change to the borders in Europe, the restoration of the old Soviet Union within its borders.”

“If Ukraine falls, he won’t stop,” Merz warned during a party conference in Munich.

Macron, meanwhile, vowed Sunday on social platform X that “France is, and will remain, at Ukraine’s side to build a robust and lasting peace — one that can guarantee Ukraine’s security and sovereignty, and that of Europe, over the long term.”

Putin has denied plans to attack any European allies.

__

Ciobanu reported from Warsaw, Poland.

Steve Witkoff, special envoy of the United States, leaves through a hotel garage for talks between representatives of the U.S. and Ukraine in Berlin, Germany, Sunday, Dec. 14, 2025. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz,stands in his office in the chancellory in Berlin, Germany, Sunday, Dec. 14, 2025. (AP Photo/Maryam Majd)

Steve Witkoff, special envoy of the United States, arrives for talks between representatives of the U.S. and Ukraine, at the Hotel Adlon, in Berlin, Sunday, Dec. 14, 2025. (Kay Nietfeld/dpa via AP)

Jared Kushner, entrepreneur and former chief adviser to President Donald Trump, arrives for talks between representatives of the U.S. and Ukraine at the Hotel Adlon, in Berlin, Sunday, Dec. 14, 2025. (Kay Nietfeld/dpa via AP)

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, right, watches Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy arriving at the chancellory in Berlin, Germany, Sunday, Dec. 14, 2025. (AP Photo/Maryam Majd)