While the Dodgers didn’t have much interest in participating in the big league portion of the Rule 5 draft on Thursday morning, they did take part in the minor league part of the draft, eventually claiming utility man Angelo Mora before the Winter Meetings came to a close.

Players chosen in the major league portion of the draft are immediately moved to the selecting club’s 40-man roster. In the case of Mora, though, because he was picked in the minor league part of the draft, he can be freely moved within the Dodgers’ farm system without having to occupy a 40-man roster spot or being offered back to his original club.

The 24-year-old Mora was originally signed as a free agent out of the Dominican Republic at 18 years of age back in 2011. He stayed in the Philadelphia system until November of this year, when he signed a minor league contract with the Orioles. But because Baltimore did not include Mora on its Triple-A reserve roster, he was available for selection on Thursday morning.

In 2017, the switch-hitting Mora appeared in 107 games across two different levels of the Philadelphia farm, slashing a combined .291/.334/.435 with nine home runs, 24 doubles and 55 RBI. He played mostly second base, shortstop and third base defensively, although he did play both corner outfield spots in a handful of games—a pedigree which assuredly fits the liking of Dodgers’ boss Andrew Friedman.

Mora’s best minor league campaign came in 2015, when he hit .312/.356/447 with 10 triples in 98 games between High-A Clearwater and Double-A Reading.

“Angelo was always an intriguing but frustrating guy,” said Philadelphia farm director Joe Jordan of Mora last spring. “He was always a talented kid. In fact, there were days when he was the best player on the field, but he was inconsistent offensively and defensively. His inability to handle adversity got in his way for a long time.”

Despite his inconsistencies, Mora’s versatility may allow him to slot in immediately at Triple-A Oklahoma City, where shortstops and third baseman are seemingly at a premium.

As for the Dodgers’ current 40-man roster goes, there’s already been a bit of fluctuation over the past three weeks. Both Dennis Santana and Trevor Oaks were added on November 20 to protect them from being lost in Thursday’s draft, giving the club a full compliment of 40 players.

Consequently, headlined by righty reliever Joe Broussard, there were more than a dozen Rule 5 eligible players left unprotected by the Dodgers, however, all of those players went unclaimed.

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