Highly likely it is just coincidental, as unlikely as it may seem
The only way the starter could have damaged the starter relay would be with prolonged excess current draw. Before this could happen the battery voltage would drop way down and Ray would have heard a long series of click, click, click, click, click, click from the relay as the reduced battery voltage would cause the starter relay coil to de-energize, then when the voltage came back up it would re-energize the relay coil. Repeat, repeat, repeat. There is no way the relay could have caused a problem with the starter.The starter relay in all years of FJRs have had some failures. Relay autopsies have found some relays have burned contacts and at least one relay had the contact debond and fall off of the relay reed.
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TMI
Even though the electrical system is DC, the rotating armature of the motor makes the current draw of the starter behave a lot like AC as each brush makes a circuit as it contacts a commutator on the armature, then breaks the circuit before the next brush picks up the next commutator. Each MAKE circuit causes high current. Each BREAK causes the circuit current to collapse. When the starter button is released the relay contacts open. When the contacts first open there can be an electrical arc initiated between the contacts, the arc acts like a tiny, high current arc welder which can cause hot-spots hot enough to melt the contact metal. The melted spot is tiny, but over time, with every start the burn area on the relay contact gets larger until final failure. A relay can be damaged by rough handling, especially as the relay is being energized or if the hermetically sealed plastic case develops a small crack. Any moisture that gets into the relay will cause a highly accelerated failure mode.
New relay contacts on the left. A heavily arc damaged relay contact on the right; there will be so little surface area to contact that it can't carry the electrical current needed to turn the starter:
Since the starter circuit is only occasionally used, as opposed to an electrical circuit that turns ON/OFF a relay quite often, no automotive/motorcycle engineer bothers to use a protecting circuit to prevent damage. It is easy to add a 'snubbing' circuit to prevent contact damage all together. One of the simplest is to use an appropriately calculated resistor and capacitor, this will essentially prevent arcing completely.
