Kuzul

The bulk of the action we’ll see this offseason on the MLB trade market is likely already in the rearview.

That doesn’t mean there’s not still time for another blockbuster deal to be pulled off between now and the start of spring training, though.

The Los Angeles Dodgers are still searching for a second baseman, the Houston Astros are still shopping for a front-line starter and a number of teams continue to test the waters for Chicago White Sox left-hander Jose Quintana.

Meanwhile, the Texas Rangers could suddenly be in the market for an impact bullpen arm after losing one of their key relievers for a good chunk of the upcoming season.

As we come down the homestretch of another MLB offseason, here’s a quick look at a few potential trade ideas, based on the latest rumblings on the rumor mill and some healthy speculation.

Begin Slideshow

There’s a light at the end of the tunnel, baseball fans.

Pitchers and catchers are set to begin reporting to spring training in less than a month as we come down the homestretch of another long and eventful MLB offseason.

With that said, it’s time for an updated look at how all 30 teams stack up around the league.

This will be the second time we’ve updated our power rankings since the conclusion of the regular season, with the first coming on Dec. 8 just after the winter meetings wrapped up, so here are a few things to keep in mind:

• Offseason rankings are not necessarily meant to be a prediction for the year ahead. Instead, they are a look at how teams would stack up with the rosters they have if the season started today.

• These rankings will be updated several more times between now and the start of the 2017 campaign, so if your favorite club is lower than you’d like, there’s still time.

• A team dropping in the rankings is not necessarily an indication that they’ve gotten worse since the last rankings, but often a case of a team below them simply pulling ahead.

Included for each team is an updated look at each club’s offseason activity and a preliminary 25-man roster.

Note: Players listed in bold on projected rosters indicate newcomers. An (R) next to a player indicates that his rookie status is intact.

Begin Slideshow

The Chicago Cubs will enter the 2017 season as marked men, looking to undertake the uphill battle that is repeating as World Series champions.

Just three times in the last 30 years has a team managed to win consecutive titles, as the New York Yankees won three in a row from 1998 to 2000 and the Toronto Blue Jays won it all in 1992 and 1993.

The Cubs have the talent to join that exclusive club.

Even with the departures of Dexter Fowler, Aroldis Chapman, Jason Hammel, Jorge Soler, Travis Wood and a handful of others, it’s hard to find a hole in the roster without nitpicking.

Kris Bryant and Anthony Rizzo will once again anchor a dynamic young offense, while the trio of Jon Lester, Jake Arrieta and Kyle Hendricks atop the rotation stacks up to any staff in baseball.

The bullpen lost one of the game’s best closers in Chapman and replaced him with another in Wade Davis, and the relief corps as a whole looks deeper than it did a year ago.

To put it simply, all signs point to another exciting season of baseball on the North Side.

Spring training is now roughly a month away, with pitchers and catcher set to report on Feb. 14 and the first full-squad workout scheduled for Feb. 18.

As we come down the homestretch of another long, cold offseason, ahead is a full preview of what to watch for out of Cubs camp this spring.

Begin Slideshow

Offense puts fans in the seats, but pitching wins championships.

As we’ve seen in recent years, that statement is all too true.

And it’s not specific to starting pitching, either, as the San Francisco Giants can attest.

The Cleveland Indians rode ace Corey Kluber and the bullpen trio of Andrew Miller, Bryan Shaw and Cody Allen to the World Series last year, while the Chicago Cubs trio of Jon Lester, Jake Arrieta and Kyle Hendricks was backed by deadline-addition Aroldis Chapman on their way to the title.

So who has the best stable of arms looking ahead to the 2017 season?

We’ve set out to answer just that, ranking all 30 teams’ pitching staffs.

A good starting rotation carried a bit more weight than a good bullpen, but you won’t see any team in the top 10 with a weakness in either area.

Begin Slideshow

Let’s pretend for a second that every player in Major League Baseball was placed on the trade block.

Ignoring things like team need and franchise direction, who would be the most valuable trade chips in this hypothetical situation?

That’s what we’ve set out to determine in the following article.

Ahead, you’ll find the top 25 future trade assets based on that hypothetical situation, but before we dive into that list, a few ground rules:

• No Prospects: Any player who still has rookie eligibility remaining was not considered for this list, as the focus was on current MLB talent. That meant no Dansby Swanson or Andrew Benintendi either, since their rookie standings are still intact.

• Three Years of Control or More: To further trim the field and because remaining team control is such a huge factor in determining trade value, a player needed to have at least three remaining years of control to be considered for this list. That excluded the vaunted 2018-19 free-agent class, headlined by Bryce Harper and Manny Machado.

• Team Control Wasn’t Everything: While one of the biggest factors in putting together this list was undoubtedly team control, it wasn’t everything. Are five years of Chris Archer worth more than three years of Madison Bumgarner? These were the kinds of questions that had to be answered.

• Position Players vs. Pitchers: The following list contains 16 position players and nine pitchers. Why the lopsided numbers? Because position players are more valuable given their day in and day out contributions, and they’re also safer long-term investments.

• Big Contracts Were a Detriment: Players such as Ryan Braun, Miguel Cabrera, Robinson Cano, Freddie Freeman, Cole Hamels, Clayton Kershaw, Jon Lester, Evan Longoria, Buster Posey, David Price, Kyle Seager, Giancarlo Stanton and Joey Votto don’t necessarily have bad contracts, but their steep price tags undoubtedly cut into their values.

Hopefully, that paints a clear picture of what went into the following rankings. Now let’s kick things off with some honorable mentions.

Begin Slideshow

It’s risky these days to call any prospect untouchable, as we’ve seen too many blockbuster deals in recent years to truly believe anyone is 100 percent safe from being moved in the right deal.

After all, who would have guessed that Yoan Moncada would be dealt this winter?

That said, a handful of prospects around the league come awfully close to being untouchable, as their future upside and expected long-term role with their teams make trading them highly unlikely.

Ahead is a look at each MLB team’s most untouchable prospect, though a number of teams didn’t necessarily qualify for this exercise, as you’ll see in the first three slides.

Is this a 100 percent guarantee that none of these players will be traded in 2017? Definitely not, but it would be a shock if any of them were moved.

Note: Players who still have rookie eligibility but are expected to begin the 2017 season on a major league roster were not considered for this article. That notably includes Josh Bell (PIT), Andrew Benintendi (BOS), Jeff Hoffman (COL), Alex Reyes (STL) and Dansby Swanson (ATL).

Begin Slideshow

For the first time since the 1909 season, the Chicago Cubs will carry the enormous target that comes with being the defending World Series champions.

There’s no shortage of talent returning for the upcoming season, and they will undoubtedly be among the favorites to win it all once again in 2017.

However, there are still some roster questions that need to be answered.

Dexter Fowler, Aroldis Chapman, Jason Hammel, Travis Wood, Chris Coghlan and Trevor Cahill are all key free agents from last year’s squad, while David Ross rode off into the sunset in retirement and Jorge Soler was shipped to the Kansas City Royals in a winter meetings trade.

That leaves the club with some important depth-chart decisions to make this spring as they prepare for the upcoming season.

Ahead is an early look at how said depth chart might unfold, including projected starters at each position, the “next man up” should injury strike, further depth options at each position and an overview of the prospects that are poised to make an impact in 2017.

Think of this as a state of the franchise roughly one month from the start of spring training.

Begin Slideshow

The second base position has quickly become one of the deepest in baseball thanks to the emergence of a handful of new young stars and the sustained success of some veteran staples.

The following is not meant to be a rundown of the current state of the position or a look back at the 2016 season, though.

Instead, it will serve as a look ahead to 10 second basemen who, for a variety of reasons, will be worth keeping an eye on this spring.

Whether it’s a player returning from a significant injury, an up-and-coming youngster ready to step into a more significant role, an impending position battle or something else altogether, the following guys enter spring training with compelling storylines.

Previous entries in our “Spring Training 10 to Watch” series: Catchers, First Basemen

Begin Slideshow

Some of the league’s most dynamic offensive players call first base home.

Miguel Cabrera, Paul Goldschmidt, Anthony Rizzo, Joey Votto and Freddie Freeman are all elite sluggers and true superstars.

You won’t find any of those players on the following list, though.

Ahead, we’ll take a look at the 10 first basemen who, for a variety of reasons, will be worth keeping an eye on this spring.

Whether it’s a player returning from a significant injury, an up-and-coming young player ready to step into a more significant role, an impending position battle or something else altogether, the following guys enter spring training with compelling storylines.

Begin Slideshow

We’re still over a month away from pitchers and catchers making their way to sunny Arizona or Florida, and the hot stove has cooled considerably, so now seems like the perfect time for an updated look at how all 30 MLB farm system stack up.

A handful of early offseason trades and a pair of winter meetings blockbusters have provided us with plenty of updating to be done since these rankings were last updated following the conclusion of the MiLB season.

We’ll likely update and tweak the rankings a few times before the start of the regular season, but the following will serve as a baseline for offseason prospect talks going forward.

The following factors helped determine the rankings of players and teams:

• Potential (Player): Potential trumps production a lot of the time, especially in the lower levels of the minors and with recent draft picks. Skill set and overall tools are often a better indication of what kind of player a guy will be in the future.

• Talent (Player): As for guys in the higher levels of the minors who are close to breaking through at the big league level, production and current talent level are the determining factors, as these players are viewed as more complete products.

• Overall Depth (Team): Having one or two elite prospects is great, but having a deep farm system from top to bottom is the way to build a sustainable contender. The overall depth and level of talent was the biggest factor in ranking each team.

• High-End Talent (Team): That being said, there is a difference between a prospect who has a chance of making an impact at the big league level and a prospect who could be a star. Elite prospects served as a tiebreaker of sorts when two teams were close in the rankings.

We’ve incorporated a tier system to help differentiate between the different levels of talent. Here’s a quick explanation: 

• Tier 1: Prospects who have an elite skill set and legitimate All-Star potential. This is the cream of the crop.

• Tier 2: Prospects who have a good chance of becoming at least a contributor at the MLB level. This is where most prospects on the following list will fall.

• Tier 3: Prospects who profile as fringe MLB contributors or young prospects who are still too raw to project any higher. Having one of these players ranked among your top 10 prospects is a good indication of a thin system.

Along with an updated list of the top 10 prospects for each team, you’ll also find some general analysis on each team’s top prospects and the outlook of the farm system as a whole.

A player must not have passed the rookie-eligibility limits (130 AB, 50 IP, 45 days on roster) to be eligible for inclusion in these rankings.

Begin Slideshow