Mark McGwire, Rickey Henderson and Jason Giambi used to smile down on Brett Wallace in their Oakland Athletics uniforms from posters hung in his childhood bedroom.

In later years, when his own baseball potential started to flourish, Wallace patterned his game after Oakland’s Eric Chavez — a fellow left-handed hitting third baseman.

On Friday, Wallace became Chavez’s likely successor when the Athletics traded Matt Holliday to St. Louis for a package of prospects headlined by the former first-round pick who spent his summers making the 45-minute trip in California from Sonoma to Oakland to watch his favorite team.

“It’s always been my dream to play for Oakland,” said Wallace, who arrived in Colorado Springs on Saturday to join Oakland’s Triple-A affiliate, Sacramento, for the final three games of a four-game series against the Sky Sox at Security Service Field.

Wallace went 2-for-6 and scored a run in his team’s 11-10, 12-inning victory over the Sky Sox in a game that ended near midnight.

Wallace, a two-time Pac-10 Triple Crown winner at Arizona State, was quickly rising through the Cardinals system before a phone call on a Triple-A bus brought him the news on Friday morning.

Drafted in the first round (No. 13 overall) in June 2008, he needed just 41 games to earn a promotion from Single A to Double A and 45 more to punch his ticket to Triple A. Rated by Baseball America as the Cardinals’ second-best prospect behind Colby Rasmus, the publication dished out praise to the 6-foot-1, 245 pound prospect, saying “think batting champ with the ability to be a big bopper.”

The only knock on Wallace is his speed and agility, plus a thick body that might thwart his longterm chances to stay at third. In St. Louis there’s no room at first base with Albert Pujols firmly entrenched — a factor that was undoubtedly considered as the Cardinals were putting together their offer for Holliday.

The deal was struck early in the day on Friday, thrusting Wallace’s name into the national sports news.

“It was like the draft all over again, that’s the only thing I have to compare it to,” Wallace said. “I almost instantly had like 115 texts and people calling me.”

It shouldn’t be long before he’s taking the field in the stadium he spent so much time visiting as a child. With Chavez’s season again derailed by injuries, Oakland has used a hodgepodge of players at third.

“I’m just excited to be a part of the organization,” said Wallace, noting general manager Billy Beane’s famed “Moneyball” approach. “They really care about their players and it’s something they’ve shown for a while now.”

Starting pitcher Clayton Mortenson, also part of the trade, was also assigned to Sacramento and may draw a starting assignment as early as Monday.

Sky Sox pitcher Greg Smith, scheduled to start the first game of a doubleheader today, was also once traded for Holliday, joining Huston Street and Carlos Gonzalez in the deal that sent Holliday from Colorado to Oakland last winter.

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