SEATTLE — Last summer, Matthew Boyd was coaching his kids’ Little League teams in a suburb of Seattle. He was rehabbing from Tommy John surgery by himself at Athletic Training Institute in Bellevue. He was throwing at Bellevue College and Eastside Catholic High School, while waiting for a call that might have never come.

He was a 33-year-old free-agent pitcher with a 44-67 record and a 4.94 ERA in nine major league seasons.

This summer, he’s an All-Star.

He’s also unsurprised.

Boyd — a Mercer Island product and Eastside Catholic alum — signed with the Cleveland Guardians on June 29, 2024, after impressing in a tryout. He started eight games for the Guardians in the regular season, recording a 2.72 ERA with 46 strikeouts and 13 walks in 39 2/3 innings. After impressing again in the playoffs — surrendering a single run across three starts in the ALDS and ALCS — he agreed to a two-year, $29 million contract in December with the Chicago Cubs.

He’s rewarded that investment by becoming a first-time All-Star.

At 34, Boyd is defying odds by bewildering batters. The former Oregon State Beaver is 9-3 with a 2.52 ERA, the undaunted ace of a team with a 2-game lead in the NL Central heading into Friday's games. He has surrendered two or fewer runs in eight consecutive outings, stockpiling quality starts with a reconstructed left arm. He sits tied for second in the NL in wins, third in ERA and fifth in quality starts (six or more innings pitched with three or fewer runs allowed).

His breakout borders on unbelievable.

But not for Matthew Boyd.

“I have an extreme level of gratitude for the level I’m performing at, and I know I can’t do it on my own, but I’m not surprised,” he said. “You always have to expect to do those things. Because if you don’t, who else is going to believe it?

“There’s very few people who believed I was going to get a big league deal last year. There’s very few people, except maybe my immediate circle, who believed I could be starting playoff games and being on one of the final two teams left in the American League. I don’t mean that with any arrogance at all, but you have to believe in what you do.”

If Boyd didn’t believe, he wouldn’t be here, preparing to pitch in the All-Star Game on Tuesday in Atlanta. After being selected by Toronto in the sixth round of the 2013 MLB draft, his career was marred by inconsistency and injury. He went 34-54 as a starter in his first six seasons, never eclipsing a 4.39 ERA. His 2021 season was shortened by triceps and forearm strains, and flexor-tendon surgery followed in 2022. He had Tommy John surgery in 2023, the highest hurdle on a track back to where he wanted to be.

Boyd had a blueprint for his breakout.

And a body that continued to break.

“I knew what I wanted to do and I was on the cusp of doing it, and then I got hurt [in 2021],” he said. “It was like, ‘OK, I want to do what really got me to the big leagues, what really gave me success early on.’ That was reading swings, changing speeds, commanding multiple off-speed pitches and moving my fastball around the zone. I was very convicted. But unfortunately, it really took the better part of four seasons to get healthy.”

Still, there were blessings amid the (many) bumps. On Aug. 2, 2022, Boyd was traded from San Francisco to Seattle for the Mariners’ stretch run. The southpaw from Mercer Island made 10 appearances in relief, allowing just five hits and two earned runs (a 1.35 ERA) in 13 1/3 innings. He helped the team he grew up watching reach the playoffs for the first time since he was 10.

“It was a dream come true,” said Boyd, who credited pitching coaches Pete Woodworth and Trent Blank for creating digestible, streamlined game plans for the Mariners’ many arms. “I used to go to the Kingdome and talk about wanting to play center field like [Ken] Griffey and pitch like Randy Johnson. To be able to put on that uniform is something I will never forget.

“To get to go to the playoffs and represent the Mariners and be part of that team that broke the playoff drought was something I don’t take lightly. It was something I’ll remember for the rest of my life. I have that teal jersey framed up on my wall. It’s something I’m just so grateful for.”

Boyd’s belief is balanced by an overflowing gratitude. In a phone interview Tuesday, he tried to name-drop the Cubs’ entire team: including catchers Carson Kelly, Reese McGuire and Miguel Amaya; the pitching department; manager Craig Counsell; and outfielders Pete Crow-Armstrong and Kyle Tucker (his kids’ favorite players).

Boyd, in fact, is grateful for all of it — the eight erratic seasons he spent in Detroit, the surgeries and rehabs and hurdles on the long track back, the magical months with the Mariners, the summer coaching his kids while waiting for a call.

“I say this in retrospect: I wouldn’t wish what I went through the past four years on anyone, from the multiple surgeries and not having a team and then signing halfway through a season, having to go through a tryout,” Boyd said. “But at the same time, there were so many blessings that came from that. I got to spend every night and morning with my wife and kids last spring and early in the summer. I got to coach them. I got to be around my family and my sister and her husband and their baby. There were so many blessings that came from it that I wouldn’t change a thing.”

Buoyed by belief, basking in blessings, Matthew Boyd is a first-time All-Star.

But this won’t be his first time at an All-Star Game.

“My dad took me to the Home Run Derby and All-Star Game when it was in Seattle [in 2001], and that was something that was so special to me,” he said. “I just remember getting to see A-Rod and Cal Ripken and Tony Gwynn and Curt Schilling and Jason Giambi and all the Mariners that were represented, from Ichiro to Edgar [Martinez] to Kazuhiro Sasaki. I remember thinking, ‘Wow, these are all the guys you watch on Baseball Tonight, and they’re in our city. This is so cool.’

“As a kid, that’s something I was in awe of. Obviously it’s a little different right now, being a big leaguer. But with that history in mind, knowing I get to represent the Cubs in the National League, it’s an honor. It’s something I’ll never forget.”

Come Tuesday, Boyd will take his four kids to the All-Star Game.

Like last summer, he’ll be with family. Just on a bigger field.

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