Kirk Gibson named NL Manager of the Year
In what comes as a surprise to no one, D-backs manager
Kirk
Gibson has been named the National League Manager of the
Year by the Baseball Writers Association of America. This
marks the second time in team history that the
D-backs’ skipper has won the award. Bob Melvin garnered
the hardware after leading Arizona to a division title in
2007.
Gibson, in his first full season at the helm, guided the
D-
backs to a 94-win season, winning the NL West and taking
the
Milwaukee Brewers to a Game 5 in the NLDS.
Gibson, who led the Diamondbacks to a 29-game turnaround
in 2011, placed first on 28 of 32 ballots. Milwaukee’s
Ron Roenicke finished second in the polling and received 3
first place votes, and the newly retired Tony LaRussa of
the World Champion St. Louis Cardinals received the other
first place vote.
Gibson joined Doug and Wolf Wednesday afternoon on Arizona
Sports 620 and talked about the honor.
“I’m certainly humbly accepting the award today,” he said.
“It’s not just for Kirk Gibson, it’s for the entire
organization, for all the people that have been very
essential for us to do what we did this year, but we’ve
got better places to go.”
Affectionately known as “Gibby,” Gibson found a way to get
a team that appeared to be short on talent to perform at
an incredibly high level, and the ability to rally late in
games seemed to indicate the team was taking on the
personality of its fiery skipper.
”
Joe Maddon of the Tampa Bay Rays won the honor in the
American League.
