Why didn’t the Red Sox close the Joe Ryan deal?

For a brief moment during the minutes leading up to Thursday’s MLB trade deadline buzzer, it appeared as though everybody atop the Red Sox organization had done their jobs. Craig Breslow had landed a bonafide No. 2 starter, John Henry was willing to pay for that starter, and the major news outlets were beginning to report the blockbuster one by one.

First, it was Fox Sport MLB:

Then moments later, it was Yahoo Sports:

And finally, Spotrac joined in:

But as is increasingly the case in our hollow, vapid world, it all turned out to be fake.