Friday, July 18, 2008

My Phavorite Phillies Cards: Top Ten List- #4

4. 2001 Upper Deck Prospect Premiers- Ryan Howard

Upper Deck took a chance including a big, lumbering 5th round draft pick in their 2001 Prospect Premier set, and in doing so, beat every other release of any other Ryan Howard card by 2 years- his next released card was his 2003 Bowman Draft Picks card:



I don't know how Upper Deck decides who to include in these sets, but they took a nice gamble on this one.


Howard is one of my favorite players ever, and I hope the penny-pinching Phillies extend him to the nice long contract that the slugger deserves.


One interesting observation on Ryan's baseball reference page:

http://www.baseball-reference.com/h/howarry01.shtml


In the "Similar Batters through Age 27" list, suprisingly, not a single Hall of Famer.

Norm Cash, Cecil Fielder, and Mo Vaughn all make the top 5 here, which is interesting when you consider the body shapes of those sluggers, and how they compare with RyHo:


Things that make you go hmmmm? Maybe we shouldn't jump on that extension just yet after all...



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