"When it was over, after Roy Halladay had coughed up a lead, and given away one of his best starts of the season with a disastrous ninth inning, Hunter Pence refused to offer even the most mild of critiques.If a loss can be explained by Halladay's faults or the whims of the baseball gods, no doubt Pence will side with his teammate each time.

"He's perfect," Pence said. "He's definitely perfect. We just didn't get the job done."

Perfection is familiar ground for Halladay, however, and he understands that the margin of error is infinitely thin. So after Tuesday's eight innings of dominance were quickly swallowed up by two mistakes in the final frame, the blame, he said, was all on him "You definitely feel like it's your responsibility to finish the game there, and didn't do it," said Halladay, who lost at Citizens Bank Park for just the second time this season, 3-2 to the upstart Diamondbacks. "I didn't make two good pitches, and it cost me."

The first was a fastball to Justin Upton. It came on the heels of a would-be strikeout pitch that wasn't called, and Halladay's follow-up offering was ripped for a leadoff single.

Halladay had retired 12 straight hitters before that, but Miguel Montero followed with a base hit of his own, and suddenly the Phillies' ace was in trouble.

Miguel Montero followed with a single of his own, and after 102 pitches from his ace, Charlie Manuel remained in the dugout, confident his pitcher could walk the same tightrope he'd traversed to much acclaim throughout his career.

Instead, the man who delivered the final blow is a 34-year-old first baseman hitting just .227 entering the game. This was a battle Halladay was supposed to win, but that second bad pitch was a cut fastball, and Lyle Overbay knocked it into the right-centerfield gap for a two-run double."