Jay Roach has signed on to direct Warner Bros.' languishing baseball sex scandal drama The Trade.

The story is based on the 1970s incident that rocked baseball when New York Yankees pitchers Fritz Peterson and Mike Kekich, admitted to swapping wives with each other. The project has been in development since 2010, with Matt Damon at one time eyeing to make the project his directorial debut, while starring alongside Ben Affleck and Casey Affleck. Those plans never materialized, due to scheduling conflicts and script revisions, with the project stuck in development ever since. Matt Damon and Ben Affleck are still on board as producers, alongside Jennifer Todd, although now they do not plan to star in the drama.

Casey Affleck wrote the most recent draft of the script, which was originally written by David Mandel. Ben Affleck and Matt Damon have been determined to get the project off the ground, initiating the push to find a new director over the past few weeks. Their passion for the sport of baseball is what drove them to keep pursuing the project, even though it centers on the Yankees, the hated rivals of their hometown Boston Red Sox.

Jay Roach most recently directed the political comedy The Campaign, and he is also developing Trumbo, a biopic centering on the life of screenwriter Dalton Trumbo, which has Bryan Cranston and Helen Mirren attached to star.