Ryan Howard will earn $900,000 in 2007. After exhausting talks with Howard's agent, Casey Close, the Phillies renewed the contract of the reigning National League Most Valuable Player on Friday, the first day teams could renew unsigned players not eligible for salary arbitration. Howard's salary is the largest paid to a player with less than two years service time, trumping the $690,000 earned by Cubs pitcher Kerry Wood in 2002. It matches that of the Cardinals' Albert Pujols, who earned that figure in the year before becoming eligible for salary arbitration.