Steve Davis: Orioles' Duquette Wins, Buck Should Too
Monday night, Dan Duquette was voted Sporting News Executive of the Year by his peers, narrowly edging out Dayton Moore of the Royals. Voting is conducted before the playoffs; otherwise Moore probably would have won.
Tuesday, MLB hands out its AL Manager of the Year -- the voting is done by the writers.
I expect Buck, who is one of three finalists along with Mike Scioscia and Ned Yost, to win. Scioscia won when the managers and coaches voted for the Sporting News award. However, this is the writers, and I think Buck will win this because managers don't tend to hold a manager's payroll against him, so the fact that the Angels had a high payroll didn't work against Scioscia. I think the writers think differently. They expected the Angels to be great. The Orioles lost 3 All-Stars and still finished with the second best record. I think Buck will be rewarded for that.
He is highly regarded by media around baseball, mostly for his acumen but also for his personality and congeniality when it comes to the media. This has been an amazing turnaround under Duquette and Showalter. To think, they have had three straight winning seasons, considering there were 14 straight losing seasons before they were paired together is really an incredible accomplishment.
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