TAMPA — Cade Winquest is where he thought he would be, just a few years delayed.

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Standing inside the home clubhouse at Steinbrenner Field on Thursday morning, Winquest flashed back to July of 2022, 30 minutes before the start of the MLB draft, when he had a Zoom meeting with the Yankees.

“They kind of told me, ‘Hey, we want you to be a Yankee by the end of the day,’” Winquest said. “It just so happened that the Cardinals had [three] picks before them and they ended up taking me before. But I was under the impression I was going to be a Yankee that day.”

The Yankees drafted a college right-hander named Cam Schlittler with their seventh-round pick, then thought they might have a chance to nab Winquest in the eighth round with the 250th-overall pick before the Cardinals scooped him up at No. 247.