Everybody’s writing about the recent success that Cincinnati Reds catcher Devin Mesoraco has been having this month.

First, Red Reporter talks about how Mesoraco, kind of forgotten, may well become the right-handed impact bat the Reds have sorely needed.

[T]he 2013 Reds lack an offensive player who is outperforming expectations. They’re like a tech company, twelve years after going public, whose stock takes a hit when they meet their revenue numbers for a quarter but decline to raise targets by 8%….In truth, there wasn’t a single player expected to contribute who you could truly point to and say “yeah, he might really blow our expectations out the of the water.”

It’s a good point. Joey Votto, Jay Bruce, and Brandon Phillips aren’t likely to be better than they’ve been the last few years. What they already are is pretty great. We know what they’re going to do. Todd Frazier and Zach Cozart are early enough in their careers that they could surprise, but they’re performing in line with what was predicted at the beginning of the season.

Which leaves Devin Mesoraco, a guy who’s getting his first taste of regular playing time with Ryan Hanigan on the disabled list for an extended period of time.

The #15 overall draft pick in the 2007 draft has caught fire, and it’s likely no coincidence that the most productive month of his career is coinciding with the month where he’s on pace to have his most consistent playing time. He’s currently .354/.396/.552 tear through 53 PA in July, and with 7 games left in the month (and Ryan Hanigan still on the DL), he looks poised to surpass his previous career high of 60 PA in a month despite the fact that the All-Star break took 4 days off the schedule.

Obviously, that’s a small sample size, but it’s encouraging. Mesoraco has never hit this well in the majors. He has a history of taking time to adjust to new levels of competition. Plus, as a catcher, he has more to learn than any other position player.

John Fay of the Cincinnati Enquirer noticed Mesoraco’s recent surge, too.

He went into Thursday’s game against the Los Angeles Dodgers with 12 hits in his last 27 at-bats. Among those hits were three doubles and two home runs. He entered the game hitting .262 with a .327 on-base percentage and .407 slugging percentage. Those numbers are comparable to Brandon Phillips.

Of course, the one potential roadblock to Mesoraco becoming the Reds’ surprise bat of the season is Dusty Baker.

“Hanigan is still going to get in there,” Baker said. “There are certain teams that don’t run when Hanigan’s in there. There are certain guys that throw well to him. I’m fortunate to have a veteran guy and a guy that’s on the way and learning.

“Someday, the job is going to be Meso’s. It’s just not now.”

Not that I expect Baker to anoint Mesoraco after one good month, but the feeling I get from this quote is that it’s almost an impossibility for Mesoraco to become the primary catcher this year, no matter what he does. I know Baker likes to protect his players–in this case Hanigan–but this is one of those times it makes him come across as an inflexible manager in a game that requires constant adjustment.

If Mesoraco continues hitting like he has in July and Hanigan struggles after he’s activated, I am confident the playing time will resolve itself, though.

Ryan Ludwick

Ryan Ludwick was sent out on rehab assignment with the class A Dayton Dragons yesterday while they played the Lansing Lugnuts. Ludwick was the DH and had three plate appearances. He popped out, walked, and singled. Nice that he’s trying out all the possibilities. Perhaps tonight he could try out that home run muscle.

Ludwick has been out of the major league line-up since Opening Day. We may finally get him back in a couple more weeks.

Zack Cozart
Zack Cozart went 4-for-4 in the first game of the doubleheader against the Giants on Tuesday, but he wasn’t feeling as great about that as he should have been. Instead, he was pulled before the game was over with stiffness in his left hip. He did pinch hit (or “pinch struck out” as it were) in the second game, but he wasn’t in the lineup at all yesterday.

Cozart is listed as day-to-day.

Ryan Hanigan

Ryan Hanigan was looking good to come back to the Reds and relieve Corky Miller of the limelight behind the plate, but he did a few too many exercises and is now too sore to play. You’ve got to be careful when you hit your thirties; just a few more pilates than you’re used to can lay you up.

To be clear, the wrist that originally took him out is just fine. He’s just sore. He’ll be back in a few days.

Jonathan Broxton

Hey, remember Broxton? He threw his second bullpen yesterday and rocked it. He’ll throw a live bullpen session in LA, and we might have him back before the road trip is even over.

Team	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	R	H	E
Reds	3	2	1	2	1	1	1	0	0	11	17	0
Giants	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	7	1

Boxscore

I ought to be talking about how Ryan Braun will sit out the rest of the season. Heck, I haven’t even mentioned the thing about Brandon Phillips complaining that the team misled him about his last contract yet. But I am just too eager to see what last night’s line-score will look like in this post. Sort of like a social security number, I imagine.

The Reds thoroughly trounced the defending champion San Francisco Giants in the wee hours of the Pacific Time Zone last night, 11-0. They scored in each of the first seven innings. In fact, since they also scored in the ninth inning of the last game before the All-Star break, I guess that’s 8 innings in a row, with an extremely long rest in the middle.

Bronson Arroyo would normally get more attention for a complete game shutout. He allowed 7 hits through 9.0 innings. He even struck out 6.

The offense is harder to summarize. Devin Mesoraco, Shin-Soo Choo, and Jay Bruce each hit home runs early on to account for three of the runs, but Todd Frazier contributed the most RBI with 3. 11 different guys had hits, and 6 different guys had RBI. Joey Votto struck out twice. Go figure.

The win brings the Reds’ record to 56-43, and brings a certain sense of catharsis to Reds fans, even those who didn’t stay up till 1 a.m. to see it finish.

They play a traditional double-header tonight to make up a rain-out that happened the last time the Giants were in town. Tony Cingrani (LHP, 3-1, 3.23 ERA) will pitch the first game against Eric Surkamp (LHP, 0-0, -.– ERA) who has just returned from Tommy John surgery. First pitch at 7:05 p.m.

Greg Reynolds (RHP, 0-0, -.– ERA) is slated to pitch the second game for the Reds against Barry Zito (LHP, 4-7, 4.88 ERA). Zito is 4-1 with a 2.45 ERA when he is the home team pitcher, but though today’s game will happen in AT&T park, the Reds will actually be the home team. First pitch will be 30-minutes after the completion of the previous game, probably around 10 p.m.

At last the Reds have hope of getting some help for the left side of the field and the right side of the plate. Ryan Ludwick, who has been on the DL since Opening Day, is finally slated to begin his rehab assignment.

Ludwick tore the labrum in his right shoulder sliding head-first in to third base and surgery was required to correct the problem. It’s been slow-going coming back for the just-turned-35-year-old. Having been 35 for a while myself now, I can understand.

But at last he’s getting back into real games. On Wednesday, he’ll join the Dayton Dragons, who will be playing in Lansing. He can has as long as a 20-day rehab assignment, and if the rehab goes as slowly as everything else, he’ll use it.

Still, “in three weeks” is better than the “never again” in which I thought we might next see Ludwick with the Reds.

Ludwick didn’t have any official at-bats before his injury on Opening Day, but he did draw 2 walks. So, his average for the season is .000 but his OBP is 1.000. Small sample-size fun in August! That’s just an awesome bonus.

How about we extend this All-Star break another week or so? Ideally I’d really appreciate the return of the sport, but honestly, I don’t quite miss baseball yet. I mean, I actually managed to finish a book during the All-Star break. An adult American reading an honest-to-goodness 900-page book in their spare time? Doesn’t that deserve a little consideration??

But the calendar marches on, and tonight the Reds open up the second half against the Pirates. Pittsburgh found itself nudged into second place behind the Cardinals just before the break, so the Reds have the opportunity to fix their eyes on the target directly in front of them.

And lest you worry that the Reds got less rest than the Pirates due to the All-Star game, realize that the Pirates’ actually had more reps in the midsummer classic. That includes two pitchers. Apparently the All-Star game rewards hitting a lot of guys.

Hopefully it will be an entertaining game at least. Mike Leake (RHP, 8-4, 2.69 ERA) will start for the Reds, and he’s due for a little good luck. He’ll have his work cut out for him as the Pirates send out Francisco Liriano (LHP, 9-3, 2.00 ERA). First pitch at 7:10 p.m.