Perseverance pays off for All-Star Steve Delabar

Alejandro Zuniga Sacks | USA TODAY Sports

BALTIMORE – Four years ago, Steve Delabar felt his right elbow pop as he fired a pitch toward home plate. When he checked the damage, he saw bone piercing his skin.

Doctors inserted a metal plate to stabilize the compound fracture. It was accompanied by nine screws and the news that Delabar would miss the rest of the season and likely the next one as well.

Few expected the right-hander to pitch at the same level again. Even if he did, Delabar hadn't made it beyond Class A ball in five years, and the dimming possibility of cracking a big-league roster was rapidly nearing a conclusive black.

But Tuesday, a very healthy Delabar will represent the Toronto Blue Jays in the All-Star Game.

Backed by his native Kentucky and baseball fans in Canada, the setup man held off four other relievers to win in fan voting for the American League's last roster spot. Delabar has surrendered eight earned runs in 42 innings of relief — and one home run – for a 1.71 ERA.

It's certainly a more lucrative gig than teaching.

While rehabbing his shattered elbow at an indoor facility in Kentucky, he worked alongside his wife as a substitute teacher and coached high school baseball in the afternoon. He wanted to make a difference, change lives. And he did. But one of the lives he changed was his own.

"Everything happens for a reason," Delabar told USA TODAY Sports. "I was OK with moving on and starting a new career in something else."

When not coaching, Delabar took advantage of a training technique designed to limit injuries. It involved practicing with weighted balls, sometimes completing a pitching motion without releasing the ball in order to strengthen the muscles in the arm. It worked and had an unintended and positive side effect. Soon, Delabar's fastball was humming along in the mid-90s.

MLB All-Star Game preview panel USA TODAY Sports baseball writers Ted Berg and Bob Nightengale and Sports on Earth's Will Leitch discuss the 2013 All-Star Game.

At the indoor facility in which he spent long hours returning to form, Delabar earned a tryout with the Seattle Mariners, perhaps his last opportunity of playing professionally. He was in his late 20s, teaching and starring in a slow-pitch softball league. But on that fateful afternoon in 2011, it was just Delabar, a catcher and the ball.

"I wasn't nervous," he said. "I was like, 'You know what? I have nothing to lose.'"

"I wanted to go in with a blank mind-set," he added. "I didn't want anything to let me down or build me up so much."

With a revamped elbow and a stronger arm, Delabar skyrocketed through the Mariners farm system.

After spending five years before the injury dabbling in Class A, he made seven appearances there in 2011 before being promoted. When he posted a 0.69 ERA in 10 appearances at Class AAA the Mariners called him up to the big leagues.

"They told me I was going, and I walked into the clubhouse, and I was like, 'All right. This is it. I'm here,'" Delabar said. "That was the moment it hit me."

Last July, Seattle traded him to Toronto, and his sublime setup work has culminated in his surprise election to the All-Star Game, which he learned about while on a team charter. Moments later, a flight attendant announced the result to the cabin, and Delabar had hundreds of text messages awaiting after landing.

"It's a good feeling to know that you have that much support," he said. "It's a huge response from the fan side. I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for the fans. This is one of the pinnacles of my career so far."