When a player tries out for the Steel City Wildcats of the Western Pennsylvania Elite Baseball League, the team is trying out for the player just as much as the player is trying out for the team.

The Wildcats schedule is not for everyone. The summer league baseball team plays between 40 to 50 games.

This year, the Wildcats had to try out more players than normal. After losing a nucleus of players who had been together for three years and had just won back-to-back Elite League titles, Wildcats manager Mark Saghy returned only four players from last season.

"This is new for us," Saghy said. "I got a little spoiled last year with such an experienced group. I don't want to call high school kids veterans, but they were. We got lucky to have that group for three years.

"I was always used to going out and getting four or five players, this year was the exact opposite -- we only had four returning."

The new look Wildcats roster is still putting up similar results as it has in the past. Through 22 games they are 16-6 overall and 4-4 against Elite League competition.

The Wildcats roster is made up mostly of players from southern high schools in the WPIAL such as Upper St. Clair, Peters Township, Washington and Mt. Lebanon.

The four returning players from last summer are Central Catholic's Nick Berger, Chartiers-Houston's Jason Paris, South Park's Tarran Senay and Upper St. Clair's Christian Wheeler. Senay was one of the top prospects in the WPIAL this year.

He had a chance to be drafted in the top 15 rounds of the Major League Baseball first-year player draft but he had made it clear that his college commitment to North Carolina State was a likely option for him. The Detroit Tigers took a chance on him in the 38th round but Senay will attend North Carolina State and likely enter the draft again in three years.

Berger and Wheeler are Duquesne recruits. Wildcats pitcher Corey Young, a recent Ringgold graduate, is heading to Lafayette to play next year and North Hills' Jake Ulizzi, another Wildcats pitcher, plans to play at California University of Pennsylvania next year.

There were plenty of holes for Saghy to fill in around the diamond before this season.

One large one was behind the plate and so far two catchers who just completed their sophomore seasons in high school have stepped up. Both Chris Miller of Serra Catholic and Jon O'Neill of Chartiers Valley got a late start to the Elite League after both making runs to the PIAA title games in their respective classes during the scholastic season.

"I saw great progress with those players over the winter," Saghy said. "You can see the winning attitude those guys bring to the team and the better approach to the game."

Another young player, Will Kengor, a Central Catholic junior, has stepped up at shortstop to fill the big shoes left behind by three-year player Jim Rider. Saghy said Kengor projects as a future Division I player.

To find these new players the Wildcats work out once a week at the Greentree Sportsplex during the winter.

"We invite kids to work out for us through the winter and it is a tryout for me and a tryout for them," Saghy said.

"They figure out if we are a good fit for them in terms of what we do in the summer. A lot of people don't want to play as much as baseball as I do. My team averages 40 to 50 games every summer between league games, playoffs and other teams I go out and play."

Last year the Wildcats played 44 games and this year Saghy has 47 games scheduled.

Along with the Elite League competition the Wildcats also travel Youngstown, Ohio, often to play doubleheaders against teams from that area.

They will be playing in two tournaments in Virginia, one at Virginia Tech and Radford and another near Richmond.

With a strenuous summer schedule, Saghy keeps about eight pitching arms around so as not to overwork any of the youngarms.

Young, Wheeler and Ulizzi along with Mt. Lebanon junior Pete Slavonic and Upper St. Clair sophomore Matt Fraudin give Saghy plenty of options on the mound.

"Those two [Slavonic and Fraudin] have high ceilings," Saghy said.

"They are still developing but both have extremely bright futures. They both have electric arms."