MORAGA, Calif. — With summer baseball in full swing across the country, Gaels will be heading all over the country to further their skills in front of scouts. Two particular Saint Mary's stars will be heading off to professional baseball, as Jacob Talamante has signed with the Gary SouthShore Railcats and Liam Steigerwald will join the Boise Hawks to begin their professional careers.
 
Talamante steadily improved every season in Moraga, culminating with him being named to the All-WCC Honorable Mention list in 2021. The fifth-year senior was one of the best leadoff hitters in the conference, leading the Gaels with a .299 batting average, and finishing inside the top-10 in the WCC with a .414 on-base percentage. Not only did he get on base at a fantastic clip, but he also was great on the base paths, finishing fourth in the conference stolen bases with 13, while only getting caught three times. 14 times this season Talamante produced multiple hits in a game, including a four-hit performance in a come-from-behind win for the Gaels in Gonzaga.
 
Liam Steigerwald helped make up the elite back-end of the Saint Mary's bullpen, and he was rewarded with All-WCC Honorable Mention honors for the first time in 2021. No Gael appeared in more games than Steigerwald this season, with 20 appearances out of the bullpen spanning 31.2 innings. Amongst WCC relievers in the top-15 in appearances, Steigerwald was one of two that had an ERA of below 2.00, with his finishing at 1.42 for the season. He walked just nine and struck out 26 on the season, and at one point featured a scoreless innings streak of 19.2 that ended on April 24. Across his two seasons at Saint Mary's, no Gael appeared in more games or sported a lower earned run average.
 
The Railcats play in the American Association of Professional Baseball, which was founded in 2005. Teams in the league range from as north as Winnipeg to as far south as Houston. The Railcats won the league championship most recently in 2013 and have made the playoffs in two of the last three seasons, after opting out of the 2020 year. As for the Hawks, they are members of the Pioneer League, which was a rookie-level league for MLB until 2020. The Hawks held an affiliation with the Colorado Rockies through that time, where their last league title came in 2004. While not affiliated with any professional teams, these serve as a way for players to get looked at in front of scouts, with the hopes of latching on with a professional club later.