Back in Detroit, 'truly thankful' Boyd joins childhood team

DETROIT -- It was the most inverse of homecomings for Matthew Boyd on Thursday.

On one hand, the left-hander returned to the ballpark where he'd spent parts of seven seasons and blossomed into an established veteran. On the other, he was in the visitors' clubhouse, now playing for a team he grew up following.

The Seattle-area-native Boyd pitched in the Majors for the first time in 361 days during the Mariners’ 7-0 win, hours after he was activated ahead of their series finale in Detroit and one month after he was acquired at the Trade Deadline from the Giants.

Comerica Park was perhaps a fitting venue to make his return from an injury that required season-ending surgery last year and kept him from pitching -- until now. Boyd, fueled by emotion and adrenaline, threw a hitless eighth inning.

“Before the outing, your heart's racing, especially in the bullpen,” Boyd said. “It's the anticipation, understanding where the game is going and what might be where you go in. So there's an anticipation of that, which was new.”

Shortly after, he went through a high-five assembly line with his new teammates, which underscores how far he’s come since surgery -- and how at home he feels with his new team.

“You don’t understand how special it is until you’re in the clubhouse, and I think that was just a great example of it,” Boyd said. “I’ve been here a month, on and off because I’ve been rehabbing, but they all know what the journey has been like, and I’m truly thankful for that. It truly speaks to the character of that clubhouse.”

Boyd was born on Mercer Island and attended Eastside Catholic High School in Sammamish, Wash., and those late-90s and early-2000s Mariners were a huge reason he fell in love with baseball. Shortly after he was traded to Seattle, Boyd posted a childhood picture of him sporting a Mariners cap and attending a game at T-Mobile Park long ago.

“I get to play for my hometown team," Boyd said. "This is just unreal. I dreamed about putting on this uniform. I'm getting chills thinking about it. I get to come to an amazing ballclub with an amazing staff and amazing guys, and I get to help be a small part of this winning organization right now.”

Boyd, who was non-tendered with one year of club control remaining, signed a one-year, $5.2 million deal with San Francisco in late March while recovering. Before he was sidelined last year, Boyd had a 3.89 ERA and 111 ERA+ (league average is 100) over 15 starts. And from there, the trade to Seattle brought him home.

At his best with the Tigers, Boyd was a front-end starter with a five-pitch mix and ranked ninth in baseball with a 30.2% strikeout rate in 2019. But the Mariners, who lack a lefty reliever, acquired him to pitch out of the bullpen, and they’re not wedded to an explicit role. His experience as a starter would be conducive to multiple innings, and he stretched out to two frames during an eight-outing Minor League rehab assignment. But Seattle also sees opportunities for Boyd to enter with traffic.

“He's got real tools, and on top of that, he's got experience,” manager Scott Servais said. “And I think you’ll see the value of that as we get into these games in September. He has been a starter. You're going to have to be careful on how many days we use him. He's going to need some down days and some rest in between outings, but I don't necessarily look at him as just a long guy.

All said, Boyd could be a big boon to a bullpen that already has been among the Majors’ elite this year. Boyd, who’s never pitched in the postseason, gets even more eager when thinking about potentially doing so in conjunction with snapping a 20-year playoff drought with the club he grew up watching.

After all, he has fond memories of 2001, when he was just 11 years old.

“You want to let your mind go there,” Boyd said. “But we have tonight, then the day after that. There's still a month-plus of baseball that needs to be [played]. Everyone knows how special that would be, especially being from the Northwest. That would be really special. But we’ve got to take care of business today and tomorrow. My goal is just to be a small part of this big machine that's going on here and something that’s special.”