Success in the Rule 5 Draft is never assured. It’s actually quite rare. The Nationals, though, were willing to take a shot on an unprotected prospect for the third straight year, hoping Evan Reifert bucks the trend and proves himself a valuable member of their pitching staff for years to come.

The Nats selected Reifert today in the final official event of the Winter Meetings in Dallas, using the No. 6 pick in the draft to snag the right-hander reliever away from the Rays.

Reifert, 25, has never pitched above Double-A, but he’s coming off a dominant 2024 season for Tampa Bay’s affiliate in Montgomery. In 34 appearances, he posted a sparkling 1.96 ERA and 0.919 WHIP, striking out 65 batters in only 41 1/3 innings.

Originally a 30th-round pick of the Rangers in 2018 from North Iowa Area Community College, Reifert chose not to sign with Texas and instead transferred to Central Missouri. He wasn’t selected in the pandemic-condensed 2020 draft, but signed with the Brewers and began his professional career.

After a strong 2021 season in Single-A ball, Reifert was traded to the Rays in a deal for big leaguer Mike Brosseau, then spent the last three seasons in Tampa Bay’s farm system. A shoulder injury derailed most of his 2023 campaign, but he returned strong this year at the Double-A level.

The Orioles completed another Winter Meetings without selecting a player in the major league phase of the Rule 5 Draft.

It used to be tradition.

The club passed again with the 24^th pick in the first round, extending its streak to two consecutive years. The Orioles had a stretch of 18 drafts in a row with a selection prior to the 2023 Winter Meetings.

The most recent choice was reliever Andrew Politi, who returned to the Red Sox as a late camp cut.

The Orioles lost their No. 8 prospect today to the Padres, right-hander Juan Nuñez, who hasn’t pitched above High-A ball and appeared in only seven games this summer due to a shoulder injury.

While the Orioles continue to work on their offseason and look to add new players to their roster, getting one already on that roster back to previous form is also on the agenda this winter.

Manager Brandon Hyde, in a phone interview Tuesday, said the club has reached out to catcher Adley Rutschman and the work to get his bat going again has begun.

Rutschman finished 12^th in the AL MVP vote in 2022 and ninth in 2023. But in 2024, his OPS dropped from .809 the previous year to .709.

Last season, on June 27, Rutschman was hitting .300 with an .830 OPS. But in his last 71 games, he batted just .189 with four homers and an OPS of .559.

“We’ve been in regular contact with Adley,” Hyde said from the Winter Meetings in Dallas. “We've put some plans in place and collaborated on some things that we feel like, that he feels like, that he wanted to kind of get back to. That kind of went away the second half. We know what kind of player he is and is going to be. We are doing a lot of things with him to get him back offensively and defensively to be the player that he is.

The shakeup of the major league coaching staff, particularly on the hitting side, isn’t leading to a massive change in philosophy, instruction and reliance on analytics and data.

It’s more about self-examination and perhaps some tweaking. Evolve rather than overhaul.

Cody Asche is the lead hitting coach after serving as offensive strategy coach for two seasons. Upper-level hitting coordinator Sherman Johnson also will serve as an assistant hitting coach, and the Orioles hired Tommy Joseph for the same role.

“I think we’ve always had an attraction to what is described as a modern coach,” said assistant general manager Sig Mejdal. “That’s someone who inspires the players, has their respect, but also doesn’t shy away from questioning convention, looking at data, looking at technology, and that describes Cody and Sherm very well.”

The Orioles have been swept in the playoffs in the last two seasons and managed only one run in 18 innings against the Royals in the Wild Card round. They went 1-for-13 with runners in scoring position, a continuation of their struggles over the second half.

Among the many questions to land in the recent mailbag was one that I put aside to give it a little more thought and provide a more expansive response.

Who will get more starts in center field next season, Cedric Mullins or Colton Cowser?

The immediate response is Mullins because he’s exclusively a center fielder and Cowser is first in line for left. Mullins made 121 starts in the middle this year and Cowser made 36 in center, 91 in left and six in right.

That’s advantage Mullins. It should be sustained next season.

I’d still expect Mullins to be the primary center fielder in 2025 after the Orioles tendered him a contract, with MLBTradeRumors.com projecting his salary at $8.7 million. He is a year away from free agency, with 2023 first-round draft pick Enrique Bradfield Jr. waiting in the wings after climbing to Double-A over the summer.

It’s a deadline day across Major League Baseball, with a host of prospects about to be added to their organization’s 40-man roster.

Officially, this is the deadline for teams to protect players from being lost in next month’s Rule 5 Draft. That draft, if you’ve forgotten, gives clubs the opportunity to snatch prospects away from other clubs for the low, low price of $100,000, provided they’re willing and able to keep those prospects on their 26-man major league roster (or injured list) the entire season.

The Nationals, who completely sat out the Rule 5 Draft from 2011-21, jumped back into the fray the last two winters, taking right-hander Thaddeus Ward in December 2022 and infielder Nasim Nuñez in December 2023. Both players made it through a full season in the majors, but Ward is now a member of the Orioles after getting placed on waivers following a rough season at Triple-A Rochester. Nuñez, meanwhile, barely played in Washington this year but did impress with his eye-popping glovework and blazing speed on the bases when he did get a chance to take the field.

Which players are eligible for this year’s Rule 5 Draft? In the most simplistic terms, it’s anyone who was drafted out of high school or signed internationally in 2020 or earlier, plus anyone drafted out of college in 2021 or earlier, who isn’t on his club’s 40-man roster.

Last year, the Nationals opted to protect four prospects from being lost, all pitchers: DJ Herz, Mitchell Parker, Zach Brzykcy and Cole Henry. The first three all reached the big leagues, with Herz and Parker becoming mainstays in the rotation and Brzykcy pitching out of the bullpen in September. Henry, whose career has been beset by injuries, totaled only 16 1/3 innings for Double-A Harrisburg and Single-A Wilmington.

A week of key dates brings us later today to players accepting or declining the $21.05 million qualifying offer. Decisions must be made by 4 p.m.

This one is easy to predict.

Corbin Burnes and Anthony Santander are expected to decline it and dive into free agency. They have rich long-term deals waiting for them. They aren’t settling for anything less.

Burnes is the top starter on the market and the Orioles are keeping the door open for a return. Santander is coming off a 44-homer season and will attract plenty of suitors. His value has never been higher.

The Orioles will receive a draft pick if Burnes and Santander sign with other clubs. That’s why you make the qualifying offer, which only applied to players who haven’t received one in the past and spent the entire season with the team. No deadline additions.

SARASOTA, Fla. – It’s the quieter times or moments off the field that can make Anthony Santander imagine his baseball life away from Baltimore. Never when he’s working out with teammates or joking with them in the clubhouse. Never when he puts on the uniform.

The games, whether real or in exhibition form, have his full attention. But he knows that free agency beckons. The 2024 season could be his last with the Orioles, who used the 18^th pick in the 2016 Rule 5 draft on a 22-year-old Class A outfielder with a surgically repaired right shoulder.

The last selection in the major league phase, with the other eligible teams passing on him.

Dan Duquette, the former executive vice president, said the Orioles didn’t have access to all of the medicals but were comfortable with the idea of giving Santander a shot based on talent. The power from both sides of the plate and run producing tools sold them.

Duquette wasn’t retained after the 2018 season, the year that Santander finally shed his Rule 5 status by spending the requisite number of days on the active roster. He fell short by 44 in 2017 due to his surgery, his debut delayed until Aug. 18 against the Angels at Camden Yards.

Spend a few minutes listening to Nasim Nuñez talk over the phone, and you quickly realize the Nationals’ Rule 5 Draft pick doesn’t fit nicely into a traditional ballplayer persona.

He’s 23 years old, born in the Bronx but raised outside Atlanta, touted as an elite defensive shortstop and baserunner who hasn’t shown a consistent ability to hit as a professional but has shown the plate discipline of a far more experienced and accomplished hitter. Oh, and he was MVP of this summer’s All-Star Futures Game.

He’s clearly confident in himself, but he’s trying not to get too worked up about the opportunity the Nationals have suddenly presented him: To spend the entire 2024 season in the majors after producing an admittedly weak .627 OPS this year for the Marlins’ Double-A affiliate.

“It was bittersweet,” Nuñez said of learning the Nats had taken him in Wednesday’s Rule 5 Draft. “Coming up through the Marlins organization, I created so many bonds with my teammates, the coaches and even the medical staff and everybody else that was there. So it was kind of a wave of emotions, of not wanting to leave but knowing there’s an opportunity out there for me to pursue my dreams.”

This is not a player who should be big-league-ready, at least not as a hitter. But the Nationals were willing to take a shot at Nuñez, rated by one entity as Miami’s No. 6 prospect, believing they can use him enough off the bench as a pinch-runner and defensive replacement to justify keeping him on the roster all season.

NASHVILLE – After making it through the entire 2023 season with a Rule 5-drafted pitcher on their major league roster, the Nationals will attempt to do the same with a position player in 2024.

The Nats selected Marlins shortstop Nasim Nuñez with the fifth-overall pick in this afternoon’s Rule 5 Draft, hoping the speedy, defensively gifted, 23-year-old can contribute enough next season to stick and perhaps someday develop into a permanent big leaguer.

Nuñez, who was set to be rated Miami’s No. 6 prospect by Baseball America, is an “elite” defensive shortstop and baserunner who draws walks at a high rate but has yet to hit consistently in the minors. The Nationals understand he’s not ready to play regularly in the majors, but they believe he provides enough skills in specific areas to give him a shot to stay on the roster the entire 2024 season.

“It’s going to be a challenge, because obviously he’s not going to get a lot of at-bats at the big-league level,” general manager Mike Rizzo said. “But I think with the coaching staff we have right now, and with the reps he will get other than gametime reps, I think we can really iron out some mechanical issues. … And I think he gives (manager Davey Martinez) an option off the bench: a defensive replacement, elite defensive skills and a baserunner. A guy that can help us win games at the big-league level.”

A second-round pick of the Marlins in 2019 out of Collins Hill High School in Suwanee, Ga., Nuñez progressed his way up the minor-league ladder and the organizational prospects list thanks to his legs, his glove and his eyes. He has stolen 183 bases in 351 professional games, including 52 this season at Double-A Pensacola. He is a strong-armed shortstop who was rated Miami’s best defensive infielder by Baseball America. He also has shown an unusual patience at the plate for a player of his age, ranking fourth among all Double-A players this year with 87 walks.

NASHVILLE – Reliever Craig Kimbrel has passed his physical and signed a contract with the Orioles for the 2024 season that also includes an option for 2025.

Multiple reports had the deal done, and an industry source confirmed it to MASNsports.com.

The New York Post reported that Kimbrel will receive $12 million next season and has a $1 million buyout in 2025 on a $13 million club option. The deal guarantees $13 million and will be the largest from the Orioles since Mike Elias became the club's executive vice president/general manager, overtaking the $10 million deal Kyle Gibson got last winter.

A late-inning reliever was a top priority for Elias, with closer Félix Bautista out next season after undergoing Tommy John surgery in October.

Kimbrel, who turns 36 in May, ranks eighth on the all-time saves list with 417 over his 14 seasons. The nine-time All-Star posted a 3.26 ERA, 1.043 WHIP, and .611 OPS against this year with the Phillies, registered 23 saves and averaged 12.3 strikeouts per nine innings.

NASHVILLE – For more than a decade, the Nationals essentially sat out the Rule 5 Draft.

From 2011-21, they didn’t select a single player in the major league portion of the event that annually closes the Winter Meetings. The thinking: A team that expected to contend each season probably couldn’t afford to use a big league roster spot on a player who wasn’t actually big-league-ready.

That all changed last winter, when a Nats club that lost 107 games now owned the No. 1 pick in the Rule 5 Draft and felt it could afford to take a flier on somebody. The team selected right-hander Thaddeus Ward away from the Red Sox and then hoped for the best from a guy who had pitched some at Double-A the previous season after returning from Tommy John surgery.

It’s hard at this point to call Ward a success story. He pitched in 26 games for the Nationals, all in relief, sported an inflated 6.37 ERA and 1.613 WHIP, all while issuing more than seven walks per nine innings.

But Ward did stick on the major league roster the entire season, even if that included 2 1/2 months on the injured list with shoulder inflammation. And so, the Nats having fulfilled Rule 5 requirements, retain his rights and now have the ability to option him to the minors in 2024 to get him more seasoning.

NASHVILLE – This afternoon’s Rule 5 draft marks the end of the Winter Meetings at the Gaylord Opryland Resort. Typically held on Thursday morning the week of the Meetings, the league bumped it up to Wednesday afternoon last year, much to the delight of beat reporters who get to travel home a day early.

The Nationals historically haven’t utilized this avenue of roster building. Designed to keep teams from stashing prospects in the minor leagues, general manager Mike Rizzo has usually turned to acquiring established major leaguers instead of taking a flier on an unproven prospect that has to take up a roster spot for the entirety of next season.

But the Nats did stray away from that last year by selecting Thaddeus Ward from the Red Sox with the first-overall pick in the Rule 5 draft, their first selection in 12 years.

Although they hold the No. 5 overall pick this afternoon and have two open spots on the 40-man roster, the Nats aren’t assured of making a selection. But that doesn’t mean the Rule 5 draft will definitely be uneventful for them.

The Nats, of course, can lose players in this event and they have already taken steps to assure they keep the ones they definitely want.

NASHVILLE – The Winter Meetings conclude later today with the Rule 5 draft. The Orioles hold the 29^th selection in the first round but can move up as teams ahead of them pass.

Probably won't matter.

The Orioles have made a selection every year in the major league phase since pitcher Alfredo Simon in 2006. They traded Simon to the Phillies for catcher Adam Donachie and cash considerations.

Donachie never played in the majors. Simon was returned to the Rangers but later signed with the Orioles as a free agent in 2008 and 2009.

The rest of the club’s Rule 5 picks were as follows:

There are two significant roster-related deadline days across baseball this week. On Friday, all teams must tender contracts to their arbitration-eligible players, with the possibility looming that some could be non-tendered. But before we get to that, today all teams must decide which of their prospects they want to add to their 40-man rosters in order to protect them from being lost in the Rule 5 draft.

This is a day that usually didn’t garner much attention from the Nationals’ perspective when they were consistent contenders and basically sat out the Rule 5 draft for a decade. But it became important again last year, both because they owned (and used) the No. 1 pick in the draft and because they had a high number of prospects they wanted to protect, forcing them to part ways with several big leaguers.

A refresher course, for those who don’t remember how this works: The Rule 5 draft gives teams the opportunity to select unprotected minor leaguers away from other clubs for $100,000, with one critical caveat: Any player selected must remain on the major league roster the entire season (90 days on the active roster) or else be offered back to the original club.

The Nats, who hadn’t selected a Rule 5 player since 2010, finally got back in the game last year by taking Thaddeus Ward with the first overall pick. The right-hander missed several months with a shoulder injury but met the required standard by staying on the active roster enough to remain with the organization, which can now option him to Triple-A if it wants.

The Nationals did not, however, have anyone selected away from them in last year’s Rule 5 draft, evidence perhaps of some smart decisions they made to protect certain players and perhaps of the lack of big-league-ready talent further down the organizational depth chart.

Before joining the Nationals, Thaddeus Ward spent parts of four unusual seasons in the Red Sox’s minor league system as their fifth-round draft pick from the University of Central Florida in 2018.

After being drafted, the right-hander appeared in only 11 games at low Single-A in the second half of the 2018 season. In his first full professional season in 2019, he went 8-5 with a 2.14 ERA, 1.156 WHIP and 157 strikeouts over 25 starts between low Single-A and High-A.

Then the COVID-19 pandemic hit and shut down the 2020 minor league season, just as Ward was peaking as the No. 9-ranked prospect on Boston’s farm, per MLB Pipeline.

Tommy John surgery limited Ward to just two starts in 2021, a major setback for any pitcher. And in his return to action last year, he made only 13 starts with a 2.28 ERA, 1.149 WHIP and 66 strikeouts across four minor league levels, topping out at Double-A.

But even after a 2.84 ERA in four Arizona Fall League appearances, Ward had not done enough to convince the Red Sox to protect him from the Rule 5 draft.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. – Thaddeus Ward has pitched in 51 games as a professional, and he’s been the starter for all 51 of those. The last time he pitched in relief: 2018 while at the University of Central Florida.

So, it’s been a while.

If Ward is going to make the Nationals’ roster as a Rule 5 draft pick, though, it’s going to be as a reliever. The Nats aren’t considering him for their rotation, maybe someday down the road but not at this point.

So all of Ward’s eight appearances this spring have come out of the bullpen, including his first back-to-back appearances last weekend. That has required some adaptation.

“It’s been a fairly significant change, but through talking to a lot of the guys here and those who have made the transition before, it’s made it a lot easier,” he said. “They’ve helped me find routines to help make sure I’m fresh day to day and able to throw. I’d say I’m starting to get comfortable with the transition.”

The Triple-A phase of the Rule 5 draft, previously known as the minor league phase, tends to be skimmed in the minds of fans and some media because the players don’t land on the 40-man roster. They aren’t spring training storylines.

My personal experience is I’m busy looking up statistics and writing about the major league selection or selections and which players are lost to other teams, and must pause to tweet out the other stuff. Those names get tagged at the bottom.

The Orioles made three selections in the Triple-A phase: right-hander Alfred Vega from the Yankees’ system, left-hander Trey McGough from the Pirates and catcher Randy Florentino from the Rangers.

McGough was interesting because he attended Mount St. Mary’s in Emmitsburg, Md. Who doesn’t love a local angle? We learned later that he is recovering from Tommy John surgery.

Nothing else really stood out among the group. Vega is 21 and he pitched in the Florida Complex League. His story requires some deep digging.

The Rule 5 draft is a resource hardly utilized by the Nationals in the past. In fact, with the No. 1 overall pick Wednesday, they made their first selection in 12 years.

But for a rebuilding team with such a high selection at such a low cost, it made too much sense for the Nats not to take a flier on a Rule 5 player and give him a shot at staying on the roster throughout the upcoming season.

So with the No. 1 pick in the Rule 5 draft, the Nationals selected right-hander Thad Ward from the Red Sox.

If you don’t know the drill by now – and no one would blame you because the Rule 5 draft is complicated and Nats fans haven’t had to worry about it in over a decade – the Nationals pay $100,000 to the Red Sox to acquire Ward and then have to keep him on the major league roster for the entire 2023 season. He has to spend at least 90 days on the active roster, not including the injured list, or offer him back to the Red Sox for $50,000.

It’s a classic low-cost, high-reward situation.

SAN DIEGO – With their first Rule 5 draft pick in a dozen years, the Nationals took a flyer on a right-hander who recently returned from Tommy John surgery, hoping he can make it through the entire 2023 season on the major league roster, most likely as a multi-inning reliever before ultimately joining the rotation.

Thad Ward, who spent the last five seasons in the Red Sox organization, was the Nats’ pick of the litter, going No. 1 in today’s Rule 5 draft, which unofficially wraps up the Winter Meetings.

"It makes you feel good as a player to know that other teams value you," Ward said in a conference call with reporters. "It’s really rewarding to see your hard work get seen. … Honestly, I’m just thankful. I’m going to leave it at that. I’m thankful for the opportunity, and I’m ready to get to work with the Nats and get this thing going.”

Ward, who turns 26 next month, was Boston’s organizational pitcher of the year in 2019 after posting a 2.14 ERA and 157 strikeouts in 25 combined starts between both levels of Single-A. He hasn’t pitched much since then, though, missing the 2020 season (along with all other minor leaguers) because of the pandemic, then missing most of the 2021 and 2022 campaigns while recovering from Tommy John surgery.

Ward returned strong this summer, producing a 2.28 ERA and 66 strikeouts across 51 1/3 innings at three levels of the Red Sox system. Seven of his starts came at Double-A Portland, where he had a 2.43 ERA and 11.1 strikeouts per nine innings.