Tuesday news and notes

Mark Sheldon has a little bit of an introduction on Denis Phipps over at Reds.com. While most of you guys probably know this, there may be some who have missed it:

Reds outfield prospect Denis Phipps was 18 years old when he was signed by the organization out of the Dominican Republic in 2004. Remarkably, he had only been playing baseball for one year at the time because he grew up playing basketball as a point guard. His athletic idol was forward Dennis Rodman.”I started baseball when I was 17,” said Phipps, who is now 26. “In my hometown, everybody played baseball and I didn’t.”

From an age perspective, he is much younger than most guys when it comes to baseball experience.

John Fay has up some notes from spring training in the Enquirer. He has a few notes on Nick Christiani and Didi Gregorius.  Go check it out.

The Royals just locked up their young catcher for an extremely cheap contract. Should the Reds consider locking up Devin Mesoraco to a similar deal? There are some differences between Mesoraco and Perez. Perez is two years younger and he did hit .331/.361/.473 in 148 at bats last season, while Mesoraco struggled in his call up somewhat. Perez is a high contact, low walk hitter who has shown moderate power in the minor leagues though scouting reports do say he has some pop that may come to fruition in the future. Mesoraco has an average contact rate, above average walk rate and showed well above average power while in the minors. Defensively, both guys have strong arms and good defensive abilities but still need some rounding out. Lets take a look at how the different projection systems like each player for the 2012 season.

The average of the projections for Bill James, Zips and Steamer seem to think that Mesoraco is going to hit for a lower average, but get on base more and hit for a whole lot more power than Perez. Over the last three seasons, the average MLB catcher has hit for a .249/.318/.389 line, though the line has actually gotten worse over each of the last three seasons. Given his top prospect status, I imagine that Mesoraco would likely be able to garner a little better of a deal than Perez did, but I ask you this: Would you go down that road yet with a guy like Mesoraco and if so, what kind of deal would you offer?

The first game of the spring is on Saturday afternoon. I simply can’t wait.