The Cardinals selected
JJ Wetherholt, who had been rumored to be an option for the Guardians at 1-1, with the seventh overall pick last year. A hamstring issue limited Wetherholt to 36 games as a junior at West Virginia, but he was extremely productive all three years in the Big 12 and during brief stints in summer leagues, including a .978 OPS in eight Cape Cod League games. Most scouts expected the 5-foot-10 middle infielder to end up at second base pre-draft and he will certainly end up there with Masyn Winn entrenched at shortstop in St. Louis. He is a plus runner, but Wetherholt's calling card is a potential 70-grade hit tool that led his draft class. The lefty-hitting Wetherholt's contact and strikeout rates were elite en route to a career .370 average with the Mountaineers, and he hit .295 with a .405 OBP, two homers and two steals in 29 games with Single-A Palm Beach. The working assumption is that the Cardinals kept him at Single-A because they didn't want to send him all the way up to Peoria, their High-A affiliate, but the fact remains we haven't seen Wetherholt perform yet against quality minor-league pitching. As long as he can be a 20-homer threat, Wetherholt's ceiling is very high in fantasy, but it's not a given that he'll get to that much power.
