Rankings/List

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.

At some point, Brian Dozier's time with the Minnesota Twins figures to come to an end. The subject of trade rumors for much of the offseason, MLB's premier slugger at second base is one of the biggest names left twisting in the purgatory that is the trade block.

It's not so much that a player's current team doesn't want them any longer (though there are certainly times where that's the case), but rather said player, like Dozier, is more valuable to the team as a trade chip than a fixture on the 25-man roster.

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.

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 the game 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:

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.

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-level sluggers and true superstars in the sport.

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.

OK, so the 2016-2017 MLB offseason hasn't been the wild spending bonanza that last winter's offseason was. But as evidence that it hasn't been all bad, I submit 15 contracts worth at least $20 million.

How about we pass the time by ranking them?

Let's go from the worst to the best. Or, put another way, from the biggest bust to the biggest steal. This is going to require weighing a multitude of factors, but they can be boiled down to a couple basic questions:

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.

Nobody's going to criticize the New York Mets for re-signing Yoenis Cespedes to a four-year, $110 million deal. Despite already having a full complement of outfielders under contract, Cespedes is unquestionably the key piece of the team's offense.

But with Cespedes back in the fold, this glut of outfielders has limited the Mets' ability to improve elsewhere—namely in the bullpen.

Fresh off a long-awaited World Series title and with a young core that rivals any in baseball, the Chicago Cubs entered the offseason with a fairly short to-do list.

Wade Davis and Koji Uehara have been added to the back of the bullpen, and veteran outfielder Jon Jay was signed to pair with Albert Almora Jr. in replacing Dexter Fowler in center field.