This Reds prospect is suddenly in danger of being lost with the Rule 5 Draft looming

With next week's MLB Winter Meetings comes the Rule 5 Draft. For those unfamiliar with the event, it allows opposing teams to select certain players from another organization who are not part of the 40-man roster. The selecting team must pay $100,000 to the rival club and then carry that player on the active roster throughout the season in order to avoid losing him to outright waivers.

To prevent players from being poached by other organizations, teams may chose to add their top prospects to the 40-man roster, much like the Cincinnati Reds did with Edwin Arroyo, Leo Balcazar, Héctor Rodríguez, and Jose Franco.

But the Reds didn't protect every prospect who might be selected during the Rule 5 Draft. Some teams may look to take a flier on a player like former first-round pick Austin Hendrick or swing for the fences and nab the power-bat of Yerlin Confidan. Both players, however, have yet to play above Double-A which makes their selection unlikely.

Reds prospect Jose Acuña is suddenly in danger of being lost to the Rule 5 Draft

But another Reds prospect may be to tempting for another team to pass up. Right-handed pitcher Jose Acuña, who's fallen out of the team's top-30 prospect ranking, could be a long shot to be selected in the Rule 5 Draft.

Selecting a pitcher is risky, but Acuña represents a rare opportunity to land a potential backend starter for next to nothing. If a selecting team were smart, they could decide to take Acuña in the Rule 5 Draft and allow him to operate out of the bullpen as a hybrid reliever.

In his 18 starts last season, Acuña logged 71⅔ innings of work and struck out 69 batters. His walk rate creeped up from 7.3% in 2024 to 12.6% last season. Oddly enough, Acuña spent the final three weeks of the 2024 season at Triple-A, but remained in Double-A throughout the entire 2025 season.

Much like the aforementioned Rodríguez, Acuña was part of the Reds' 2022 trade with the New York Mets. Many scouts see Acuña as a back-of-the-rotation starter who could debut next season. Whether or not it's with the Reds may depend on how other teams view in during Thursday's Rule 5 Draft.