Trade with Underdog!

This is more like a 2 parter. I've been bad about scanning and cataloging lately but I am trying to catch up. Both of these came over from The Underdog Card Collector! I enjoy the blog name, great cartoon. I still owe a return package for the 2nd part, but obviously still working on that with a few other packages to some people. (well that was vague)

Anyways, go baseball! Ryan Howard is up to 3 HR's and the Phillies won today!

 

It was nice to receive some Heritage. I haven't bought any of it, and I'm not really planning on it. Not my personal favorite set. Too many short prints that are kind of part of the base set but not really for my liking. Some old school Pinnacle. The inserts on the bottom left are pretty cool looking cards. Gotta love 90s ingenuity. 

 

Glorious randomness in this scan. Mike Schmidt, Ryan Howard, Kyle Kendrick (now the Rockies #1 starter?!) a really cool Cole Hamels orange refractor. It'll be a sad day when he is traded by the Phillies. He was flat out amazing in 2008. MVP in the NLCS and the World Series and there wasn't a lot of debate. 

The way contracts are these days, check this out.. 

Cole Hamels remaining contract: 

2016, 2017 and 2018 23,500,000 per year with a club option of 20,000,000 in 2019

Rick Porcello contract:

2016, 2017 20,125,000

2018, 2019 21,125,000 

Porcello is younger, but he has not earned that ace type money. I don't get it but I think this will be a tremendously bad contract by the end of it. The only plus is that its 4 years and not 7. I'm not even a Red Sox fan but I think this can skew the market. Now league average pitchers will want at least 15 mil a year. 

In conclusion, if the Phillies trade Hamels, get a good prospect (or three) and don't pay a dime of the contract. 

Thanks for reading!