Thomas/By S. Bradley

BOSTON — Last summer, Tim Thomas trade rumors were all the rage.

Today Bruins general manager Peter Chiarelli explained how dealing the eventual Conn Smythe Trophy winner wasn’t as close as some reported.

“If you can recall at the time there was kind of a mutual agreement between myself and Tim and Bill Zito, Tim’s agent, just to explore it and on the premise that Tim does not want to leave Boston,” said Chiarelli. “And that’s really where it ended. It’s really where it ended. And there was some calls … and they kept him in the loop at all times and he kept stressing he didn’t want to leave. And I said I know, let’s just look at this very briefly. And I know there are a lot of stories that flowed from it, but I can’t stress enough the fact that Tim never wanted to leave. And I wouldn’t be doing my job if I at least didn’t look at some things, and I did.

“You go through those things, on a number of fronts on a number of fronts, on a number of players. You just field stuff, you look at them, you talk to other teams. And at the end of the day you make the decision yay or nay. And here it was nay. And it was an easy nay.”