Ben Cherington - Executive of the Year

©Kayla Chadwick 2013

Red Sox General Manager Ben Cherington has been named the Sporting News Executive of the Year. The award was decided by a voting panel of 31 Major League executives, and this year marks just the fourth time in MLB history that a Red Sox exec earned the honor.

Of the thirty-one votes, Cherington got fifteen, while Neal Huntington of the Pittsburgh Pirates got nine, Dayton Moore of the Kansas City Royals got four, and Frank Wren of the Atlanta Braves got three.

Cherington's award is a testament to how much people love an underdog story. If any team with the payroll capabilities of Boston could be considered an unlikely winner, it was this one. After an unbelievably disastrous 2012, the worst-to-first romp of 2013 was both glorious and unexpected.

Cherington's offseason moves (signing Shane Victorino, Koji Uehara, and Mike Napoli, among others) are certainly to be congratulated, but the true start of the 2013 turnaround came late in 2012, when the Dodgers gave the Red Sox a mulligan on some truly mammoth contracts. Without the trade of Carl Crawford, Josh Beckett, Adrian Gonzalez, and Nick Punto, the Red Sox would never have the chance to win it all in 2013.

So maybe Cherington should send a case of World Series champagne out to the LA front office? Because without them, he doesn't get this award.