(Story by Marco Stoovelaar; Photo by Henk Seppen)
   Award for Xander Bogaerts from Boston Media
Nederlands
 BOSTON, Massachusetts (USA) -
Aruban-born Netherlands National Team-player Xander Bogaerts has received another award from the Boston Chapter of the Baseball Writers Association of America.
This time, he won the Jackie Hensen Hustle Award after being named Red Sox MVP a year ago.
The award was handed out on Thursday (January 19) during the 78th annual dinner of the Boston BBWAA at the Boston Marriott Copley Place.
The votes of the members of the BBWAA annually decide the outcome of the Most Valuable Player, Cy Young Award and Rookie of the Year in both the National and American League.
The baseball-journalists also elect new members to the National Hall of Fame annually.
Local chapters of this media-organisation host their annual dinners, meetings or galas to also hand out awards to players and personnel of the local club(s) for the performances in the previous season.
Winners can also come from outside their 'area', as was the case on Thursday when two awards were handed out to former members of the Boston Red Sox-organisation.
On Thursday, twenty awards were handed out by the Boston BBWAA, which celebrates the past and present of the Boston Red Sox with these distinctions.
The Thomas A. Yawkey Red Sox MVP Award went to rightfielder Mookie Betts, who batted .318 last season with 31 homeruns and 113 runs batted in.
Betts finished in second place in the voting for American League Most Valuable Player.
Betts became the youngest winner of the award, a record that was set last year by Xander Bogaerts, who then was named Team MVP by the Boston-media.
Short stop Xander Bogaerts this year won the Jackie Jensen Hustle Award for his outstanding baserunning and his day-to-day presence as short stop throughout the season.
Bogaerts played in 157 of the 162 regular season games of the Red Sox.
Only Betts played in more games.
...Xander Bogaerts playing for the Netherlands Team...
...during the 2013 World Baseball Classic...
(© Photo: Henk Seppen) |
Centerfielder Jackie Bradley, Jr. won the Special Achievement Award for his 29-game hitting streak in April and May of last season.
That was the longest hitting streak by a Red Sox-player since Johnny Damon's streak of 29 in the 2005 season.
Former Boston General Manager Theo Epstein won the Major League Executive of the Year Award.
Since October 2011, Epstein is the President of Baseball Operations of the Chicago Cubs, which last year won the World Series after 108 years, for the first since 1908.
In November 2002-October 2011, Epstein was the General Manager of the Red Sox.
During his tenure, in 2004, the Red Sox won their first World Series-title in 86 years.
The team won the title again in 2007.
Former Boston-Manager Terry Francona was named Major League Manager of the Year.
Last season, he guided the Cleveland Indians to the World Series, winning the American League-title.
Francona is Cleveland's Manager since 2013.
He led the Red Sox in 2004-2011 and won two World Series with the team.
Former Boston-pitcher Luis Tiant received the Judge Emil A. Fuchs Award for his long and meritorious service to the game of baseball.
Tiant still is a frequent visitor of Red Sox-games at Fenway Park.
The Cuban-born righthander pitched for the Red Sox in 1971-1978.
Tiant played a big role for Boston in the postseason of 1975.
He won two games in the World Series, which eventually was won by the Cincinnati Reds.
Tiant always smokes big cigars and even has his own line of cigars, which is called 'El Tiante', which is his nickname.
The New England Sports Museum Lifetime Achievement Award went to Pete Frates in honor of his work to fund research for ALS.
Frates is the former captain of the baseball-team of Boston College, who was diagnosed with ALS (Lou Gehig's disease) in March 2012.
In 2014, it was Frates who took the initiative for the Ice Bucket Challenge, which has raised millions for the fund worldwide.
Pitcher Rick Porcello won two awards.
He was named Pitcher of the Year and also won the Tim Wakefield Award for Community Service.
Craig Kimbrel was named Best Reliever and won the Fireman of the Year Award.
David Ortiz, who retired after last season, won the Ted Williams Hitter of the Year Award.
'Big Papi' played for the Red Sox from 2003 to 2016 after having played for Minnesota Twins in 1997-2002.
Last season, his 14th with Boston, the Dominican played in 151 games and batted .315 with 38 homeruns and 127 runs batted in.
He led the American League in RBI's.
In his impressive 20-year career, Ortiz played in 2,408 games and collected 2,472 basehits, including 541 homeruns.
He batted in 1,768 runs and scored 1,419.
For the first time, the Fall Classic Award was handed out to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the Red Sox winning the World Series in 2007.
The award went to Mike Lowell, who was named MVP of the 2007 World Series.
Other awards handed out were:
Comeback Player of the Year: Hanley Ramirez.
Unsung Hero: Sandy Leon.
Minor League Player of the Year: Andrew Benintendi.
Lou Gorman Award: Robby Scott.
Tommy McCarthy Good Guy Award: Steven Wright.
Ben Mondor New England Player of the Year: Rich Hill.
Tony Conigliaro Award: Yangervis Solarte.
Dave O'Hara Award: Nick Cafardo, who covered the Red Sox for more than 30 years.
(January 21)
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