Mariners' Hevly earns top PR award

LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. -- Longtime Mariners director of baseball information Tim Hevly was named the 2013 winner of Major League Baseball's Robert O. Fishel Award for Public Relations Excellence on Monday at the Winter Meetings.

Hevly, 47, has been the club's baseball information director the past 16 years and has worked for the Mariners since 1990.

"The biggest thing is it's a nice acknowledgement of the people I get to work with in my department," Hevly said. "It's more about them. It's an acknowledgement from the people in our industry that our organization does a great job."

The annual award goes to the "active, non-uniformed representative of Major League Baseball whose ethics, character, dedication, service, professionalism and humanitarianism best represent the standards propounded by Robert O. Fishel," who was the inaugural winner in 1981 after working with the Indians, Browns, Yankees and the American League office.

The nominees are voted upon by active past winners, MLB officials and the Baseball Writers' Association of America.

"I'm very excited for him," general manager Jack Zduriencik said. "It's a great recognition and recognition that he deserves. We are all fond of him and we are looking forward to seeing him give his acceptance speech."