“A triple short of the cycle” is a classic baseball cliche, and for good reason. A player has collected a single, double and homer 242 times in 2017 alone, but entering Saturday, only six players were able to complete the set. Triples are hard, especially for a player like Jose Abreu.
Abreu came to the plate in the eighth inning on Saturday a triple short of the cycle. He’d had eight such games before, so the phrase sounded amusing and/or trite as it usually does for a man his size.
And then he tripled.