A look back

Every baseball season is memorable for multiple reasons. Wins or losses. Comebacks. Players. Plays. Games. The following are a few of the things that would make it on a Wild Things 2012 Highlights/Lowlights video:

* Starting with the most recent ... Andrew Heck becomes only second player in Wild Things history to play all nine positions in a game, doing so in the regular-season finale against Schaumburg. Heck does not commit an error and pitches two-thirds of an inning, allowing one run (unearned) with a strikeout.

* The Wild Things' bus broke down near Columbus, Ohio, during a trip from Lake Erie to Florence, Ky. It ended up being a 7-hour delay until a new bus arrived.

* Washington released outfielder James Simmons, who was signed in the offseason and had Class AAA experience, only five games into the season. Simmons later signed with the Bridgeport Bluefish of the Atlantic League, where he is hitting .284 with 11 home runs and had Bridgeport's only hit off Roger Clemens during the future Hall of Famer's comeback game.

* There was the night the lights went out in Washington. During a July 17 game against Evansville, the majority of the lights at Consol Energy Park are knocked out and the game is suspended because of insufficient illumination. It was completed the next morning.

* During a series at Windy City, and following a game against the ThunderBolts, the Wild Things' bus does not go directly back to the hotel, instead going to the airport to allow the team to pick up a new player. This is a first in franchise history, and it had to leave more than one player who was already on the bus wondering if he was about to be released to make room for the new guy. An uncomfortable situation to say the least.

* In Washington's first 10 seasons, only once did a player steal four bases in a game. After being acquired Aug. 1 in a trade with South Illinois, outfielder Darian Sandford stole four bases in a game twice for Washington. In 30 games with the Wild Things, Sandford stole 26 bases, but also was thrown out 16 times. Sandford led the Frontier League with 71 stolen bases.

* Prior to a game against Rockford in early July, pitching coach Tim Ferguson "resigns." It's the second time in 11 seasons that Washington's pitching coach resigned before the season reached the all-star break.

* The most bizarre event of the year happened after a July 24 home game against the London Rippers. Earlier in the evening, the Frontier League announced the Rippers would be suspending operations at 12:01 a.m. that night. The league did not prevent London from making trades. After the game, Washington manager Chris Bando and hitting coach Jim Tatum, along with two front office representatives, stood outside the Rippers' clubhouse and tried to broker trades for London players. They managed to get four players to agree to join the Wild Things in exchange for four players who would be assigned to the traveling Road Warriors.

* During an August series at West Division champion Gateway, the Wild Things went 14 consecutive innings without a hit.

* After having four players signed by affiliated teams last year, the Wild Things had only one this season, relief pitcher Nate Striz, who had his contract purchased by the Boston Red Sox. Striz ended the year as the closer for Boston's affiliate in the Class A South Atlantic League.

* In a series at Southern Illinois, Washington starts a game with pitcher Orlando Santos as the designated hitter. And he doesn't bat in the No. 9 spot.He bats cleanup.

* Washington signed two players, infielder Anthony Long and catcher Cody Coffman, had them on the active roster for three games, did not put them in a game and then released them. The Wild Things also drafted outfielder Michael Miller in the first round at the league tryout. Miller made the regular-season roster but was traded after five games and not getting an at-bat.

* The Wild Things had a fixation with the independent Pecos League. They either signed or drafted eight players from the Pecos. There were three pitchers, and only one made the team. He was released after appearing in only eight games. Of the five hitters signed, only two were on the team in the regular season, one did not register an at-bat and the other went 4-for-29 before being released.

* Washington tied the record for its longest game, playing a 17-inning contest at home Aug. 4 against Lake Erie. The Wild Things overcame 23 strikeouts by Lake Erie pitchers to win 2-1.

Your cleanup hitter tonight: Joel Hanrahan

There are some things I'm certain I'll never see, even in the wacky world of minor league baseball.

One is a game-ending triple play. Oh, wait, I saw that in a game between the Wild Things and Kalamazoo a few years ago.

Well, there's always a son of a former Pittsburgh Pirates outfielder being called out -- the final out of the game -- for missing home plate after hitting an apparent game-tying home run in extra innings. ... On second thought, I did see that on the Internet. If you don't believe me, then Google "Raul Mondesi Jr." And keep in mind that former Wild Things manager Jeff Isom was the manager for Mondesi's team in that game.

Moving on, I don't think I've ever seen a power outage ... oh, wait, ...never mind.

I guess about the only thing I haven't seen is a manager start his closer at designated hitter and bat him in the cleanup spot. Can you imagine Clint Hurdle starting Jole Hanrahan at DH and batting him in the No. 4 hole? Think that would make people question Hurdle's sanity?

Well, that, in a way, is what Wild Things manager Chris Bando did Friday night when he filled out his lineup card.

Bando started Orlando Santos, who has been sharing Washington's closer's role since the all-star break, at designated hitter and batted him in the cleanup spot against the Southern Illinois Miners.

You read that correctly. Santos batted, and not in the No. 9 spot. He batted cleanup. No. 4. Ahead of five other starters.

Let's keep in mind that Santos isn't your typical relief pitcher. He broke into professional baseball in 2006 as a catcher. He remained a catcher into the 2009 season, when he was converted to pitcher. Santos had a career .244 batting average in three years of rookie ball.

So Santos is a guy with a bit of a hitter's background. But keep in mind, as far as one can tell from researching it on the Internet, Santos didn't have an at-bat in a professional game since 2009. His last at-bat in a game in the United States, when they were keeping statistics, apparently was July 10, 2009 -- more than three years ago.

But there was Santos hitting cleanup Friday night. At first, I thought it was a mistake on the Poinstreak site's live scoring. Had to be a mistake, I thought. The scorekeeper in Marion, Ill., had to have punched the wrong player's number into the computer, right?

But no, Orlando Santos was Washington's cleanup hitter.

I would have liked to have been a fly on the wall when Miners manager Mike Pinto received Washington's lineup and saw a relief pitcher batting cleanup.

But, hey, this shouldn't come as a total shock. After all, pitcher Eric Blackwell has started two games in right field and one at designated hitter, batting No. 6 in the lineup twice and No. 7 once.

Two things keep running through my mind about this:

* Santos got a hit in the game and got better with each at-bat. He struck out with the bases loaded in the first inning. In his second at-bat, Santos hit a nubber in front of the plate on an 0-2 pitch and was thrown out by the catcher. In the sixth inning, he hit a hard line drive to the third baseman, and in the eighth inning he dropped a single into center field.

* What does this say about the other hitters on the team? What are the position players who weren't in the lineup thinking? It had to be something like this: "I can't believe a relief pitcher is batting and I'm not. Am I that bad?" And what does this say about the five guys in the lineup who batted behind Santos? The guy hasn't batted in a pro game in three years and he was batting higher in the lineup than five guys.

There are many hard-to-explain things that have happened with the Wild Things this year. This is just one more. Maybe, a few years from now, we'll be able to say "Remember that time the Wild Things started their closer at DH and used him as the cleanup hitter?"