The New York Yankees reached out to former Boston Red Sox GM Ben Cherington about possibly working for the team after he resigned from his post in August, according to Joel Sherman of the New York Post.

Cherington, 41, was a part of the Red Sox organization in some form since 1999. But after a dreadful 2015 season culminated with the team hiring former Detroit Tigers president Dave Dombrowski to serve as the Red Sox president of baseball operations, Cherington elected to resign in lieu of remaining as the GM. His efforts over the past decade-and-a-half earned him the respect of current Yankees GM Brian Cashman. 

I reached out to him,” Cashman tells The Post. “I have a lot of respect for him, his integrity and how he did his job.”

During his stint with the Red Sox, Cherington played a big part in assembling three World Series winning teams (2004, 2007, and 2013). While the end of his tenure did not have a fairy tale ending, he was still regarded as one of the premier executives in the game. Also, with the Yankees losing assistant GM Billy Eppler, who left to be the GM of the Los Angeles Angels, Cherington conceivably could've taken over for Eppler.

However, Cherington has expressed a desire to step away from baseball for the time being to pursue other ventures. In fact, Cherington will join Columbia University as an Executive-in-Residence, per a press release. He will be teaching a course on leadership in sports as part of the university's Master of Science in Sports Management degree program.

"The addition of Ben to our Columbia program, reflects our commitment to building a curriculum that combines the real world experiences of sports industry leaders, with the academic rigor of an Ivy League University," said Vince Gennaro, the Director of the Columbia University Sports Management Program.

Despite his new endeavor as a teacher, Cherington is expected to return as a front office executive sometime in the future. He turned down offers to be interviewed for GM openings with both the Philadelphia Phillies and Seattle Mariners organizations. Both of those vacancies have since been filled but it shows that teams were still interested in at least talking to Cherington.

The Red Sox are a different team now, a younger one than the 2013 World Series champions. But Cherington did leave behind several impressive youngsters that the Red Sox hope turn into mega stars, including Xander Bogaerts, Travis Shaw and Henry Owens.

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About the author
Mark Suleymanov
Mark covers Major League Baseball and professional wrestling for various outlets. He currently covers wrestling for his blog The Mark Out, The Inquisitr and ReviewFix.com and baseball for Call to the Pen, H4TV, and Vavel.