As last summer’s amateur draft sped toward him, Cardinals budding prospect Harrison Bader became preoccupied by the possibilities, wondering how high his personal stock could climb even as the performance his Florida teammates needed from him fell. He had scuffled, gone hitless in the first two games of the SEC Tournament, and fallen headlong into “a bit of a rut,” he said. “I was the guy stumbling to the end, losing sight of the team because of the draft.”
That’s when David Eckstein asked for a moment of his time.
The former Florida standout and Cardinals World Series MVP was in Hoover, Ala.