Dodgers: Three prospects the Dodgers can afford to trade this offseason

C Keibert Ruiz — MLB Pipeline Rank: 6 (100 overall)

The Los Angeles Dodgers have a lot of depth at the catcher position up and down their lineup. So much depth that there could even be a possibility of trading Yasmani Grandal this offseason in favor of assets elsewhere. Regardless, right now the team has Austin Barnes, Grandal and Kyle Farmer all ready to take reps at the big league level.

And that is only scratching the surface of how deep the organization is at catcher.

Los Angeles has four catchers on their top 30 prospects list. Of those four, two are ranked in the top ten. Will Smith, who spent most of his time at A+ Rancho Cucamonga last season, is the eighth best prospect in the Dodgers system. The other is Keibert Ruiz, who is the sixth best in LA, the 100th best overall and the fifth-best catching prospect.

The Dodgers signed Ruiz — at sixteen years old nonetheless — out of Venezuela in 2014. Ruiz has done great in the Dodgers farm system in just over 200 games played. Ruiz is batting .330 in his minor league career and has struck out in just 11.7% of his plate appearances.

Although Ruiz does not have the power numbers, his natural hitting ability is evident. With so much depth at catcher, the Dodgers can afford to capitalize on Ruiz’ great minor league numbers that could overvalue the young catcher.

We likely would not see Ruiz in the majors until the next decade, anyway. With other young guys ahead of him, trading him may be the best utilization of his talents.