With the 59th pick in the 2012 MLB Draft, the St. Louis Cardinals selected Steve Bean, a catcher from Rockwall High School in Texas. Here's what MLB.com had to say about Bean:
It's not a great class for catching, especially from the high school ranks, so Bean has the chance to do pretty well come Draft time, especially considering he's a left-handed-hitting backstop. The University of Texas commit makes consistent hard contact and should have some future power. He has a strong arm behind the dish and should have the receiving skills to stay there long term.
This supplemental pick has always been the wild-card in the controversial trade that sent Edwin Jackson to the Cardinals in exchange for erstwhile super-prospect (and top 2005 pick) Colby Rasmus—now we, the fans worried in the first place about trading for a mercenary as the team appeared to spiral out of contention, can finally get a look at the last player the Cardinals got, indirectly, from the Blue Jays. Of course, in the meantime the whole narrative has changed a little—if Edwin Jackson never quite ingratiated himself with Cardinals fans, ostenisble throw-in Octavio Dotel rapidly became one of the team's most popular, and effective, relievers while they did that whole winning-the-World-Series thing.
With that the Cardinals end their distended first round of the 2012 MLB Draft, but draft season isn't over yet—follow along on this storystream and at Viva El Birdos as the Cardinals continue to repopulate their farm system.