Halladay: 'This is where I wanted to be'
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Halladay: 'This is where I wanted to be'
Daily News staff
Here are comments from new Phillies pitcher Roy Halladay and general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. during a press conference, announcing Halladay's arrival.
Roy Halladay
"I'd like to start by thanking everybody in Toronto, the fans, the organization, the people. It's been a big part of my life and something I'll never forget. I enjoyed my time there. I'm also extremely excited about a new chapter and having this opportunity to be a part of such a great organization and somewhere that my family and I are really looking forward to being a part of." Halladay also thanked his agents and his family for their support.
"This is where I wanted to be. That was the bottom line for us. It was an easy decision. Once the opportunity came up to be a part of this it was something I couldn't pass up. I think there are things not only in business but in life that are worth it. For me, this is one of those things. There are so many positives to this for me and my family. I just couldn't pass it up."
"This is a dream come true. The longer you play in your carer the more important (winning) becomes. I've been able to establish myself, achieve things. The more I play, the more I realize how important that is for me. To see a team do it in back-to-back years and have that success says a lot about the players in the clubhouse and people that are putting the team together. It's not an accident. I want to be a part of that. I've heard great things about the people and great things about the organization. That is big for me."
"The biggest thing is having a chance to win and hopefully do it a couple of times. For me, that was the biggest factor."
"During the season, I felt it was important that I keep my focus where it was [with the Blue Jays] and not put too much into it."
Ruben Amaro Jr.
"Being able to acquire one of the finest pitchers in all of baseball is something very special to our organization. To be able to lock him up for four years, and possibly five, is something we're very, very, pleased about."
"I don't know if I want to get into some of the things that went on at the trade deadline, but I will say he is a pitcher we have coveted for a long time, one of the best pitchers in baseball and pitching in one of the best divisions in baseball and having great success ... This is a baseball decision that we felt would make our club better now and for the future. While we did give up a trremendous amount of talent, it doesn't come around very often that you have a chance to bring a player of this caliber to your organization."
"We could have kept both of them (Lee and Halladay), but it was a baseball decision for me and our organization and the people in the organization. We could not leave the cupboard bare. If we had just acquired Roy and not moved Lee, we would have been in position to have lost seven of the best 10 prospects in our organization. That is not the way you do business in baseball ... There are a variety of reasons to make this move, but more than anything else this is a baseball decision."
"Clearly, it was known that Alex was considering moving Roy. I did make contact with Alex during the GM meetings. We had some preliminary discussions then and things kind of snowballed after that."
"I don't know if I ever said anyone was untouchable. What I said was someone was more touchable than others. To acquire someone of this caliber, you are going to hurt your system and it should. That's part of the business ... .We are not able to make these moves unless we have one of the best farm systems in baseball. [Assistant GMs and scouting staff] deserve a lot of credit for bringing in players in our system and develop them to acquire this caliber player. It's difficult for us to pass up when you've got an opportunity to make ourselves this much better and get this caliber of player."
"I would love to have both of them on our club. My job is to continue to have this club be a championship caliber team not just for 2010, 2011 but for many years beyond that. To that end, you have to have players in our system that will help us get there ... We did acquire some outstanding players from Seattle in a trade for Cliff Lee. Cliff Lee did an outstanding job for us. There is nothing negative that I can say about the things Cliff Lee did for us and for our club for the half year he was here. This was an opportunity to get one of the best pitchers in baseball and bringing him here for several years."
M60tanker, I hope he does not show up at the Link on Opening Day, he will be a few hundred yards away from the pitching mound...— ZackAttack- Dumb move. Should have kept Lee too. We had 1 ace last year, and we lost to the Yanks, and now we have 1 possible ace in the upcoming year - what's changed? In fact, Halladay has never pitched in the playoffs at all!!!! Crazy move.— Liberty4All
- "The biggest thing is having a chance to win and hopefully do it a couple of times. For me, that was the biggest factor." People: Do not worry. It's not gonna be hard to root for this guy.— sla6yer
- Montgemery and Ruben did a masterful job of confusing their fans by making it look like that the trades were related :-) Phillies fans are not fools. They could have kept both and probably win a WS next year. But they decided to pocket 9 mil and probably lost 100 mil earning opportunity in the process. Montgomery actually fooled himself...— Seed
- The Link??? WTF?!— KannonWired965
- Nasty and the best righthanded pitcher in the game!!!— sawgrass
Comment removed.- I just went to the NY Daily News website and the fans are absolutely crying for Minaya to do something - ANYTHING. It's a great time to be a Phillies fan. Too bad some of the baseball geniuses on here don't get the "game" behind the game.— vafan
- I'm from Toronto and I'm mad that the Jays let go the BEST pitcher in the major , If any philies fans have any doubt as to how good Roy will be ? Watch after 4 years have gone by and then you will understand as to why I am mad...— mikebreta
- why on earth didn't they keep lee,and still land halladay??just doesn't make sense.i'd sent whoever they wanted outta the farm,JUSTto keep cliff.this is going to haunt us,wait and see.even if it meant giving up happ.o well its done now.so welcome in halladay,we still move on.but cliff lee will surely be missed.he proved a very steady starter,and won us over.ruben,u guys must have been backed in a corner to make this deal.i still would have gave up prospects for him,and kept lee.!!!!— t_darb_56
- Comment removed.
- The silence of our players on this series of events is deafening. Would be nice if the beat writers in this town weren't so beholden to the team to point out the obvious. Story here is that for one of the only times in the mostly pathetic history of this organization the Phillies ballclub had a chance to do something truly great--put together a team that would beat all comers and be remembered for generations--but decided not to when they traded Lee for second tier prospects in hopes of having asome possible bullpen arms and a replacement for Werth in 2011. Halladay, Lee, Hamels plus Happ/Blanton teamed with our incredible offense could have taken down any team in baseball in the WS, could have made the 2010 Phils one of the greatest teams ever. Now we'll be no better off than last year--very good, WS contender, but definitely not favored against the best the AL has to offer. If it ends like it did last year for the rest of this team's time, sorry to say 2008 will nationally just be a story of how the Phils got lucky to beat a green and overmatched Rays team that got hot at the right time in the AL playoffs and took down the Sox when they were in transition, while Yanks were down too. This Lee deal reeks of all the old cheapness and bad reasons for doing/not doing deals. Team is now only slightly better than last year. Love how the Phillies buried the Lee trade in their e-mail to all the fans. What a joke. Trade for Halladay is nice. Trade for Lee is a Curt Schilling style salary dump, plain and simple. Maybe that made sense when the team had no shot at the World Series, let alone the postseason. But now, one more year of Lee is worth a lot more than the chance that some of the A/AA players we got pan out and help the bullpen in a few years.— Glass House Guy
- Welcome to Philly Roy!!!!! This deal should've happened last year and we would've beaten the Yanks (with Lee and Halladay) in 5...Ruben you are starting to sound like the Eagles organization...— TheFirstStateVinman
- That front-page pic of Rubes staring at Halladay is disturbing.— Stuie
- Cole will be back to his 2008 form. Happ will be better than 2009 with one year as a big league starter under his belt. Blanton will eat innings as always and give us a chance to win most nights. Moyer or Kendrick will fill out the rotation as "keep us in the game until we get to the bullpen"-type guys. Halladay will make all these guys better while getting his customary 17+ wins. I like our chances, man. I really do. Can't wait 'til Spring Training. GO PHILS!— vafan
