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• Useless Triple-Play Info: You can't exactly say the Mariners hit into a triple play Saturday in Tampa Bay. They did something way more creative than that. They allowed the Devil Rays to turn a triple play without a ball even being hit -- or, in fact, without a bat even being swung.

Yep, it was the old 2-6-2: Strikeout looking. Runner on first thrown out stealing second. Runner on third thrown out trying to sneak home.

Think you don't see that much? Bingo. Devil Rays public relations genius Rick Vaughn headed right for the SABR triple-play database and determined:

This was the first 2-6-2 triple play in history. And it was only the second TP ever to start with a strikeout and involve just two players. The other was a 2-3 trifecta pulled off by the Chicago White Stockings against the Cleveland Blues on May 20, 1880.

By the way, because of technical difficulties (i.e., failure to invent the TV camera yet), you won't be seeing any video of that one on the Greatest Web Gems of All Time highlight reel.

• Useless 40-40-40 Club Info: Who says you can't trade for a famous starting pitcher in midseason anymore? This summer proves it's very possible -- as long as you don't mind if it's a pitcher with four decades worth of tread on his tires.

The three most prominent starting pitchers traded in the past month and a half were all 40-year-olds -- Greg Maddux, Jamie Moyer and David Wells. And there sure haven't been many seasons where something like that happened.

According to the Elias Sports Bureau, there have been only two other seasons since 1900 in which three 40-year-old starting pitchers played for more than one team in a season (at any point):

1985: Tommy John (Angels, A's), Joe Niekro (Astros, Yankees) and Don Sutton (A's, Angels)

1987: Steve Carlton (Indians, Twins), Joe Niekro (Yankees, Twins) and Phil Niekro (Indians, Blue Jays, Braves)

But John actually was released by the Angels in '85. So this year and '87 are the only two seasons in modern history in which three 40-something pitchers have been traded in one year. Who knew?

• Useless Win-Drought Info: We've heard of long winning streaks -- but three years? Well, that's how many calendar years it had been since the Astros lost a game to the Phillies -- until Labor Day.

That was Houston's first loss to the Phillies in 3 years, 101 days -- since May 18, 2003, believe it or not. And even though those teams had only played each other 12 times in that span, Elias reports they still broke the Calendar Club's favorite record of all time -- most days between losses by one team to any other team.

The previous record: 3 years, 99 days, by the Yankees over the Twins, between May 10, 2001 and Aug. 17, 2004.

• Useless Hit-Streak Info: They don't make many 30-game hit streaks like Willy Taveras' recent 30-gamer. Hit-streak historian Trent McCotter reports that if Taveras hadn't doubled in each of the final two games of his streak, he would have set an all-time record in this prestigious category: fewest extra-base hits in a hit streak of 30-plus.

Those two doubles got Taveras to seven extra-base hits in the streak -- one more than Luis Castillo had in his 35-gamer in 2002 and one more than George Sisler had in his 35-game streak in 1924-25. (Incidentally, just for contrast's sake, Chase Utley got 25 extra-base hits in his recently defunctified 35-gamer.)

Taveras also did something in his streak that would seem to be impossible: He went through an 0-for-11 funk -- in the middle of a 30-game hit streak.

How? He singled to lead off the Astros' 18-inning loss to the Cubs on Aug. 15, then went 0 for his last 8 that day and 0 for his first 3 the next day. But he saved the streak by laying down a bunt single in his last at-bat. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, no player in the past 40 years has had an 0-fer that long in a streak that was even as long as 20 games.

• Useless Start-Me-Up Info: In the past 40 years, according to Elias, only two players have spewed out 80 extra-base hits or more while hitting leadoff. But any minute now, we'll be able to say two of our foremost leadoff authorities have matched that feat just this year.

This year's duo: Grady Sizemore (80 already) and Alfonso Soriano (74 of his 82 total extra-base hits out of the one-hole).

The other two: Soriano in 2002 (89) and Nomar Garciaparra in 1997 (85).

• Useless Can't-Blame-It-On-The-Bambino Info: You don't need us to tell you August was one seriously crummy month for the Red Sox. But we can be the first to tell you exactly how crummy it was.

They went from one game ahead of the Yankees to eight games behind, just in the month of August. And according to Elias, that's only the second calendar month in history in which the Red Sox started a month in first place and lost nine games or more in the standings by the end of the month.

The other was not in 1978, by the way. It was September 1974. The Red Sox started that month three games ahead of the Yankees -- and ended it in third place, 6½ behind the Orioles. But the Sox lost only 8½ games in the standings to the Yankees that month. So in Red Sox-Yankees annals, this was yet another new benchmark.

• Useless There-Goes-That-Streak Info: But it wasn't just the Red Sox who have proved that, sometimes, seasons just last a little too long for some teams. The Phillies, for instance, went 132 games into this season without losing a single game they led after eight innings. Then, of course, they lost two in a row (Aug. 31 and Sept. 2).

Well, if it makes them feel any better, at least it's not unprecedented to do that sort of thing. In 1990, according to Elias, the Orioles made it through the first 142 games without a loss like that. Then they, too, lost two in a row. Greg Olsen blew a save Sept. 14. None other than Curt Schilling did the honors the next day, allowing a three-run, game-ending homer to Kelly Gruber.

• Useless Welcome-To-The-Show Info: Delmon Young always said he was ready for the big leagues. (Of course, he'd been saying that since he was, like, 12.) But apparently he was right. In his first three major league games, he got eight hits. So Devil Rays PR genius Rick Vaughn wondered, naturally, how long it had been since somebody had done that. The amazing answer, according to Elias: Willie McCovey, in 1959.

• Useless Heeeere's Barry Info: If you could have sworn there was a Barry Bonds multihomer sighting last week, you were not hallucinating. It might have taken him two years to the day since his last multihomer attack, but Bonds finally did hit two homers in a game Aug. 29. In between his two-homer games, the list of guys who hit two includes Jason Smith, Cody Ross and Ryan Freel. (Heck, Damion Easley even hit three.) But thanks to the Sultan of Swat Stats, SABR home run historian David Vincent, we can even tell you which players had the most multihomer games in those two years while Barry had zero. These names might sound familiar:

David Ortiz 14
Andruw Jones 13
Jason Giambi 11
Mark Teixeira 10
Manny Ramirez 10

• Useless Multitalent Info: Jose Valentin just had the first multihomer game of the second-base portion of his career. He already had hit two (or more) in a game while playing short and third. So, the Sultan reports that makes him just the eighth player in history to have multihomer games at three infield positions -- none of which was first base. The others would be a group of people you've never seen hanging out together anyplace before this in history, we'd bet:

Dick McAuliffe
Gil McDougald
Daryl Spencer
Don Zimmer
John Valentin
Tony Batista
Geoff Blum

• Useless You-Can't-Stay-Young-Forever Info: In the first game of Delmon Young's major league career, he homered off Freddy Garcia. In Garcia's previous start, he'd served up a homer to Delmon's brother, the no-longer-hanging-in-Detroit Dmitri. So we asked the Sultan to come up with a list of pitchers who have given up homers to brothers in the same week. And the result is one of the most fun Sultanian lists of all time:

Aaron brothers
Jack Billingham (1969) -- to Tommie on June 16, to Hank the next day

DiMaggio brothers
Bill Dietrich (1942) -- to Joe on June 3, to Dom on June 7
Steve Gromek (1948) -- to Dom on Aug. 24, to Joe on Aug. 27
Hal Newhouser (1948) -- to Dom on June 20, to Joe on June 25

May brothers
Steve Foucault (1976) -- to Carlos on June 12, to Lee on June 19

Conigliaro brothers
Jim Hannan (1970) -- to Billy on Sept. 19, to Tony (2) on Sept. 24

Molina brothers
Randy Johnson (2005) -- to Bengie and Jose on the same day (July 31)

Waner brothers
Dolf Luque (1927) -- to Lloyd and Paul on the same day (Sept. 4)
Doug McWeeny (1929) -- to Lloyd and Paul on the same day (June 9)
Cliff Melton (1938) -- to Lloyd and Paul on the same day (Sept. 15)

Ripken brothers
David Wells (1990) -- to Cal and Billy on the same day (Sept. 15)
Scott Davison (1996) -- to Cal and Billy on the same day (May 28)

Alomar brothers
Bobby Witt (1997) -- to Roberto on July 28, to Sandy Jr. on Aug. 2

Giambi brothers
Ramon Ortiz (2000) -- to Jason and Jeremy on the same day (May 8)
Sterling Hitchcock (2001) -- to Jason and Jeremy on the same day (Aug. 11)
Pat Mahomes (2001) -- to Jason on April 15, to Jeremy on April 21
Eric Milton (2001) -- to Jeremy on July 19, to Jason on July 24
Ryan Franklin (2001) -- to Jason and Jeremy on the same day (June 21)

Guerrero brothers
Paul Byrd (1999) -- to Vladimir and Wilton on the same day (Oct. 2)
Brian Anderson (2000) -- to Vladimir and Wilton on the same day (May 18)
Jesus Sanchez (2000) -- to Vladimir (2) and Wilton on the same day (Sept. 18)

Jayson Stark is a senior writer for ESPN.com. Send your Useless Information to uselessinfodept@yahoo.com.