Hey folks, for those of you who are familiar with my ongoing battle my mechanic got my '00 Tracker with the 2.0L J20 engine running, but (and it's a big but) after running for a few minutes and the oil pressure light turning off the valves are still really noisy, almost as if there's no oil getting to them. He says to take the valve cover off and run it to see if oils getting up into the valve cover, to try a pressure gauge, and that the problem could be the oil pump. IMO this sounds like a solid start since there aren't any leaks anywhere or any smoke coming out of the exhaust to indicate excessive oil in the cylinders.

Is there anything else I should consider as well?

P.s- In case you're wondering "Wait, what was keeping it from starting before?" well boy oh boy have I got news for you: while they were probing wires and circuits they turned it over and it just decided it wanted to bloody start. I.e no clue what it was but apparently just trying to find the problem fixed it.

Happy day.

Thanks everyone!

(Cross-posting on other forums too)