  Blue Jays Roy "Doc" Halladay faces off against Rays' lead-off hitter B.J. Upton Friday night in Toronto. (Jack Boland/Sun Media) 
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Standing ovations are a post-performance rite, not one the comes before a pitch is thrown.
But there was little that was on the same-old, same-old scale last night at Rogers Centre.
The standing O was, of course, for the Blue Jays Roy Halladay and came as he trudged from the bullpen to the dugout before his opening toss against the Tampa Bay Rays.
It came from the heart of all the participants for the man they so admire.
A second standing O, this one longer and louder, greeted Halladay as he left in the ninth, his team tied 2-2 and after 115 pitches, everyone in the park knew he wouldn't be coming back this night.
But what about tomorrow?
There would be no final triumph this night for Halladay or the Jays, who lost 4-2 in the 10th.
But like the professional that he is, Halladay gave it his all and delivered the goods, allowing two runs, one unearned, on four hits while striking out 10.
As for the pre-game ovation, Halladay seemed embarrassed by the attention.
"It's nice but in some ways it's hard because I'm trying not to look that far ahead and think that this might be my last start here," Halladay said of ovation No. 1. "Obviously it's much appreciated and I love the fans here, they've been great. But I just haven't looked that far ahead."
Halladay, though, was the centre of attention last night and despite his later-stated belief that he didn't think he would be dealt, it was a distinct possibility that he was making his final appearance at Rogers Centre in a Jays uniform.
With the trade winds nipping at his heels, Halladay is a 50-50 shot to be moved by the Jays prior to the July 31 non-waiver deadline. The big right-hander has one more scheduled start for the Jays before that date -- July 29 in Seattle -- if he lasts with the team that long.
He thinks he'll stay.
"Right now I believe I will be here," he said. "It's a complicated situation and I think for that reason I've never felt like there has been a big press on being moved or wanting to be moved. If there was an urgency to be somewhere else or an urgency for the team to have me somewhere else, I think it would be different. I just don't get that feeling."
General manager J.P. Ricciardi, who had a lot to say Thursday, was under the cone of silence last night.
"I'm not talking about Halladay," he said before the game. "I'll talk on the 31st. There's nothing else to say."
Halladay stated over and over his desire to win, be it here or elsewhere and elsewhere looks like it has the best possibility given the Jays youth among their starters and lack of productivity and consistency among its hitters.
"I think at some point you have to catch lightning in a bottle, a lot of things have to go right, kind of what happened for Tampa last year," he said of the possibility of winning here.
Signing back, though, is something else and won't happen in the off-season. At that point, he'll take a peak at free agency following the 2010 season.
"I really feel like I've fulfilled a lot of obligations (with Toronto) and I think you have to be at some point a little bit selfish in what you want," he said. "It's based on having a chance to win. I hope it's here but I think for me you'd hate to look back and regret that I had this three or four window and I didn't take the chance to give myself the best opportunity and that's I'm trying to do whether it's here or somewhere else."
MIKE.RUTSEY@SUNMEDIA.CA
