Any path it could possibly take is equally unlikely.

It is. It’s similarly unlikely that I win the lottery. But someone always does!

The situations are in no way analogous.

Sure they are. There are likely trillions of these things. We are likely gonna see them everywhere. Like scratch-off lottery cards.

We have seen 3.

Yes. In very quick succession, right after we put the tech in place to find them.

In the mid 1990s we’d only seen a handful of exoplanets. That they were basically everywhere we looked early on clued us in to their prevalence.

We have seen 3 and one of them makes a very close pass to 2 major planets. Seems very unlikely.

If you are unaware of gravity, sure. It is accelerating towards the sun, which also happens to be where the planets are.

I urge you to take a look at how much empty space there is around the Sun.