Nationals' Yasel Antuna: Protected from Rule 5 draft

Antuna's contract was selected by the Nationals on Friday, Brittany Ghiroli of The Athletic reports.

Antuna was part of the Nationals' player pool this season but remained at the team's alternate training site. He's at least a moderately interesting prospect, but battles with injuries and then a season lost to the coronavirus pandemic have conspired to limit him to just three total games since the start of 2019, all of which came at the rookie-ball level. The highest level the 21-year-old has reached is Low-A, where he struggled to a .220/.293/.331 line over 87 games for Hagerstown in 2018.