The Brewers chose not to select a player in Thursday's Rule 5 draft and will thus leave the Winter Meetings having not updated their roster at all.
Milwaukee had the 16th selection in the draft, but 11 of the 15 teams ahead of them chose a player, leaving the talent pool a bit shallow. The Brewers obviously didn't see anything worthwhile of the remaining players. Neither did the teams after Milwaukee, as only two other players were taken in the Rule 5 draft. You can see a complete rundown of selections here.
Last year, the Brewers surprised the Pirates by exploiting a loophole to take Wei-Chung Wang in the Rule 5 draft. Per the rules of the transaction, Wang had to be kept on the major league roster all season or be offered back to the original team. Wang spent most of the season on the active roster, but did have a two-month period where he was out with an injury.
When Wang was on the active roster, he was sparsely used. He appeared in 14 games, primarily in cleanup duty, and posted a 10.90 ERA and 2.2 WHIP. However, because he counted towards the major league roster all year, he is now without restrictions and can return to the minors to continue his development.
If the Brewers were to make a pick this year, the overwhelming likelihood would have been for them to take a reliever who they felt could pitch in the majors immediately. Any such player probably wouldn't be better than what they already have, though, so Milwaukee will instead look towards other means of bolstering the bullpen.
The Brewers made moves during the 2014 season (acquiring Gerardo Parra and Jonathan Broxton) and traded for Adam Lind very early in the off-season, leaving little to be done unless the team were to make a surprising deal. Indeed, much of the talk about the Brewers during the meetings centered primarily around how set the team was.
Though Milwaukee didn't take anyone, they did have two of their players chosen in the minor league portion of the draft: Outfielders Sean Halton and Kentrail Davis.
#Brewers purposely exposed OFs Sean Halton and Kentrail Davis to AAA phase of Rule 5 draft to accomodate them. Not in big-league plans.
— Tom (@Haudricourt) December 11, 2014
Halton spent some time in the majors with the Brewers in 2013, but was organizational depth in 2014. Kentrail Davis, meanwhile, was the less-impressive K. Davis in the organization. They were chosen by the Orioles and Angels, respectively.