By Michael Rushton
It appears the Phillies believe Ryan Howard is just as good as Albert Pujols.
Philadelphia renewed the contract of Howard on Friday at a price of $900,000. That price tag makes Howard, the reigning NL MVP, the largest paid player ever with less than two years of service time in the league.
Howard's new salary by far passes the $690,000 Cubs pitcher Kerry Wood got in 2002 and is dead even with the amount Pujols received from St. Louis in his final year before becoming eligible for salary arbitration.
Howard had a team-high 58 home runs and 149 runs batted in last season with Philadelphia, and also led the club with a .313 batting average.
Howard can't become a free agent until 2011, meaning there is no urgency to sign the slugger to a long-term deal. And the fact that Howard received just as much as Pujols did before he signed a high-priced long-term deal shows how much respect the Phillies have for their first baseman.
A long-term deal was something that was discussed, but not necessary at this time.
"We discussed a variety of things," assistant general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. said in a story on the team's official Web site. "It is our goal to keep our star players in pinstripes and we're going to work to that end. We didn't get to the finish line on this, but we'll have continued talks on this one."
No comments:
Post a Comment