The 2012 MLB Draft hasn't even started yet, but in my capacity as editor of Viva El Birdos I've already noticed a St. Louis Cardinals fan favorite emerge—the stupendously named Stryker Trahan, a left-handed hitting high school catcher with excellent all-around hitting skills. Tim McCullough of Future Redbirds encapsulates The Case For Stryker Trahan perfectly here; basically, if you believe Trahan can stick at catcher he could be Brian McCann. He would be a fit for the Cardinals at No. 19 or No. 23, and with Yadier Molina locked into a long-term contract he would instantly become the long-term heir apparent, with bat enough to help elsewhere should Molina still be entrenched by the time he's ready.

This reminds me a lot of Daric Barton in 2003, only with more catching ability and a little less hitting hype. Barton, thanks in part to his emergence on a perennially dysfunctional Oakland Athletics team, has never quite lived up to the potential he flashed as a teenaged Wade Boggs in the Midwest League. But if he were at catcher he probably would have made an All-Star team by now.

More 2012 MLB Draft coverage from SB Nation St. Louis:

• All this depends on whether the Cardinals' new draft strategy involves high schoolers at all.
• What we know right now: They plan to be very aggressive.