Enough with this "a triple shy of the cycle" nonsense

Last night, Carlos Zambrano "nearly" became the first pitcher to hit for the cycle, smacking a single, double and home run against the Diamondbacks. After the home run, his last hit, the AZ announcers noted that he was "a triple shy of the cycle." I am so sick of announcers saying that someone was a triple shy of the cycle. I guess it's okay during the game when he could still get it (although I think it should have been clear that Z was not coming up again), but referencing it in game stories is functionally nonsense. Let me lay some numbers on you really quick:

So, since the start of the 2000 season there have been, very roughly, around 400,000 games played by major league players. In those games:

A player has hit for the cycle - at least one each of a single, double, triple and home run in the same game - 41 times. Pretty rare occurrence. Amazingly, there have already been three (Orlando Hudson for the Dodgers, Ian Kinsler for Texas, and Jason Kubel for the Twins, who capped his with a grand slam) in the 2009 season.

70 times a player has recorded a double, triple and home run but failed to get a single, making this nearly as rare an occurrence as actually hitting for the cycle. It has yet to happen in 2009.

217 times a player has hit a single, triple and homer but failed to get the double for the cycle. It's three times more likely than missing just the single and more than five times as likely as completing the cycle, but it's still pretty rare. It also hasn't happened yet in 2009.

504 times a player has fallen a homer shy of the cycle, including four times in 2009.

So, how many times has a player "fallen a triple shy of the cycle"?

2,540.

Two thousand, five hundred and forty! Just since the year 2000! Including, by the way, 37 times already in 2009, including twice by Mark DeRosa alone. To give you some impression of how many times that is, there have been just 1,178 ten-strikeout games by pitchers since the start of the 2000 season, including 15 so far in 2009. Not that ten strikeouts is an easy thing to do, but if you're watching a game, it's more than twice as likely that one of the hitters will fall "a triple shy of the cycle" than that one of the starters will strike out ten guys. (Zambrano had only three Ks last night.)

So, with that in mind, is there any chance we can stop making a deal out of a guy going "a triple shy of the cycle"? The triple is the hard part. Getting the rest? Turns out it's not so hard. It happens hundreds of times per year. Enough.