AP

Cardinals coach Bruce Arians is one of the leading contenders for coach of the year for his work in leading the Cardinals to at least 10 wins in his first season with the team, but Arians isn’t interested in banging the drum for himself.

He is interested in banging the drum for General Manager Steve Keim, however. During his Monday meeting with reporters, Arians took some time to stump for executive of the year votes for the man in charge of personnel in the desert.

“If he doesn’t get executive of the year, something’s wrong,” Arians said, via the Cardinals website. “People want to talk about coach of the year, [expletive], I just coach the team. He deserves to be executive of the year because what he did in his first year was phenomenal.”

Keim’s moves have worked out well for the most part. Carson Palmer’s not perfect, but not perfect is a huge step up from the positively dreadful situation that the Cards had at quarterback last year and running back Andre Ellington has given them good production for a sixth-round pick. Karlos Dansby and John Abraham have bolstered the linebacking corps, Tyrann Mathieu had a strong rookie year at safety before getting hurt and veterans Yeremiah Bell and Antoine Cason have also helped in the secondary.

The Chiefs had the biggest one-year turnaround in the league this year, but the Cardinals aren’t far behind. Both Keim and Arians should get plenty of credit for the job they’ve done this year, whether or not it results in official awards when the season is over.