Ryan Howard is the best player of the decade in Philidephia sports.

I believe that while ryan howard is a very good player, but Cole Hamels is the greatest of the decade. He won the MVP of NLCS and World Series in the year the Phillies won the world series. Cole Hamels enters the 2011 season as the youngest of the heralded Phillies starting rotation, having just turned 27 this past December. He's already pitched four full seasons – plus the majority of a fifth – in the Major Leagues, and has established himself as a premier pitcher entering his prime. Hamels is the front-runner to be the best player on the Phillies over the next five years, Halladay and Lee included. This young, homegrown talent has already accomplished so much, and is just entering his prime. He appears in line to receive – and is, for all intents and purposes, deserving and worthy of – a five- or six-year deal worth around $90 million. Time remains for the Phillies to decide if they can afford yet another large contract on their books. In Hamels's case, he happens to be worth it, at least as we sit here today at the dawn of a new slate of spring training games. He's proven durable enough to make 30-plus starts per year, and effective enough to have the 15th-most strikeouts of any pitcher in his first five seasons since 1901. Cole Hamels is good. Real good. He was drafted and groomed by the Phillies, and rewarded the club by being a key part of a championship team. He's done his part. Will the Phillies do theirs? The first key statistic explaining his turnaround is his average fastball: 92.0 MPH. This is 1.8 MPH faster than his 2009 fastball. The second key statistic is Hamels' reliance on his newly developed cutter 14.7% of the time. This is pretty significant considering 2010 was Hamels' first season using the pitch. The third statistic is the 55.4% contact rate of pitches he threw out of the strike zone. This is a 7.8% decrease in contact rate from 2009, while also increasing his opponents' swing percentage of those outside pitches from 2009 to 2010 (26.% to 29.7%). Synthesizing these three statistics together reveals that Hamels' not only threw more effective pitches than the past year, but he took his pitching style to a new level. A 2 MPH increase on your fastball is significant and the added cutter to his arsenal allowed him to throw the fastball less, making it an even more difficult pitch to hit. In strengthening his fastball while also adding a cutter, Hamels made it more difficult for batters to not only lay off pitches out of zone, but to also make contact with those pitches. Thus Hamels lowered his BAA from .269 to .235 and his line drive percentage from 20.8% to a career low 16.7% – a sign that hitters were not able to make as solid contact with Hamels' pitches when they did make contact. These are all great signs that Hamels 2010 line is sustainable. Before the year started, everyone thought that the Philadelphia Phillies had the best pitching in baseball and were a shoe-in to win the NL East. They were right. Saturday behind a complete game from Cole Hamels, the Phillies ran their winning streak to nine games with a 2-1 victory over the now hated rival San Francisco Giants. Philadelphia is now 74-39 (.655), 9.5 games up on the Atlanta Braves in the NL East with the best record in MLB on pace to win more than 106 games. The Phillies had lost two of three games to the Giants late last month at home causing at least this one writer to opine that San Francisco and not, Philadelphia had the best pitching staff in MLB. That series followed last season's National League Championship Series, in which the Giants upset the Phillies on their way to winning the World Series. Had the Phillies stumbled again this week, there would have been legitimate concerns about their ability to beat the Giants. Although it's just one week later, perhaps it's already time for me to issue a mea culpa of sorts as Philadelphia has outscored San Francisco 14-3 so far in the first three games of the four game series, pretty much putting the theory to rest that the Giants were in their heads. And while on July 29th the Giants had the best ERA in MLB at 3.06 and the Phillies were at 3.11, as Sunday, August 7th rolls around, it is the Phillies with a 3.06 team ERA and the Giants with a 3.19. While I may have been guilty of jumping to conclusions about the Giants being ability to outpitch the Phillies on a regular bases (still not convinced I'd be wrong if they matched up in the playoffs btw, but for now I'll concede to avoid more Philly hate mail as it's not certain that Giants will even make the playoff), one thing that I do not have issue a mea culpa for is my opinion that Cole Hamels has a great shot to win the NL Cy Young this year. This is something that I've been harping on since preseason. Check out Hamels' 2011 numbers juxtaposed next to his two Cy Young candidate teammates. Hamels has the lowest ERA, the lowest batting average against and the lowest WHIP. For those of you less versed in pitching metrics, in short this means that Hamels allows the least base runners on base per 9 innings and the least amount of players to cross home plate as well. To me, Hamels has the inside track on the NL Cy Young award. If he doesn't win it, is simply because the three guys end up stealing votes from eachother. Now onto the head to head. In the year it most matter being the 2008 when the phillies won the world series Cole hamels not only won the mvp in the nlcs and the world series, but he had a war 1.6 wins higher which is what it all comes down to. home run derby doesnt matter Source baseball-reference.com espn.com fangraphs.com phillienation.com