There’s no debating that general manager Steve Keim has done an outstanding job as the general manager of the Arizona Cardinals in his two-plus years on the job.

After years in the Cardinals front office, Keim got the call to head up the football operations department prior to the 2013 season. He inherited a 5-11 football team that was making a coaching change and didn’t have a serviceable quarterback on the roster.

Oh, how that has changed.

The Cardinals have notched back-to-back double-digit win seasons and Arizona is coming off of their first playoff appearance since 2009.

The desert has become a destination for big-name free agents and Keim has shown a deft touch in adding hungry, established veterans on short-term deals.

For all he’s done, Keim has been ranked the NFL’s fourth-best general manager by Sporting News.

The tradition of the Cardinals front-office ineptitude appears to have ended: Keim, the Sporting News executive of the year last year, is making this generation of Bidwills running the team look brilliant. Injuries ruined a potential Super Bowl run last year, but Keim built a roster that’s both potent and deep, and snatched up the perfect coach for it in Bruce Arians.

Keim trails only Seattle’s John Schneider, Baltimore’s Ozzie Newsome and Green Bay’s Ted Thompson in the Sporting News rankings.

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