2011 Rule 5 Draft Liveblog

The Rule 5 Draft is the unofficial end of the Winter Meetings, a snoozefest of fringe prospects and journeymen joining new teams hoping to find a diamond in the rough. But because we love fringe prospects and journeymen here at RAB, I’ll be liveblogging the whole thing.

Just five of the 19 picks in last year’s Rule 5 Draft managed to stick with their new team, with lefty specialist Joe Paterson of the Diamondbacks likely representing the best of the bunch (3.44 FIP in 34 IP). Joel Sherman says the Yankees were going to take Paterson last year, but Arizona beat them too it. They ended up rolling the dice on righty Danny Turpen and lefty Robert Fish instead, but neither player made it through Spring Training. They lost George Kontos (Padres) and Lance Pendleton (Astros), but both were returned before the season started and eventually made their big league debuts later in the summer. Expect more of the same this year.

The Yankees protected five players — IF Corban Joseph, RHP David Phelps, RHP D.J. Mitchell, OF Zoilo Almonte, and IF David Adams — but did not clear any additional roster space in advance of this year’s draft. They have one open 40-man roster spot, so they can select only one player in the Major League portion of the draft. Joel Sherman says they were planning to make a pick as of last night, and I’m hoping for Ryan Flaherty, a left-handed hitting utility guy in the Cubs’ system, but he’s unlikely to get to them. The Hiroyuki Nakajima stuff could also affect their pursuit of bench help. Pat Venditte is the player they’re most likely to lose, just because someone will want to take a look at the left/right thing in camp. I expect him to be offered back at some point.

I apologize in advance for any misspellings, some of these names will be tough. The draft is scheduled to start at 10am ET, so I’ll open up the chat/liveblog a few minutes before that.