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Blue Jays general manager J.P. Ricciardi says that he was never close to trading Roy Halladay.

Ricciardi told the Boston Globe that "we never came close" to dealing the pitcher, although two or three teams tried to acquire the former Cy Young winner.

There had been a report a few hours prior to Friday's non-waiver trade deadline that Toronto had a deal in place with the Angels, but Ricciardi denied it.

"I had informed Roy at 2 p.m. that he was staying with us. We were never close with the Angels," he said. "Throughout this process I couldn't believe the amount of bad information that was out there. I know the media are in a competitive situation to get the story first, but this process was an eye-opener for me."

Hoopstarr wrote:You just got the feeling that the US media really really wanted Doc to be traded. Since big market teams were interested, the big media sources were all over it from the beginning, even though JP clearly said they were only listening to offers and not actively trying to trade him.