Durham, NC- The American Association of Independent Professional Baseball opens its seventh season this Thursday. The El Paso Diablos will kick the season off with a 10:30 AM (MST) contest against the Fargo-Moorhead RedHawks. El Paso will send RHP Eric Blackwell (pictured) to the hill in the opener.

Thursday will feature the American Association’s first interleague game. During the 2012 season, two of North America’s best independent leagues will face off throughout the season, as clubs from the American Association and the Can-Am League will play 100 interleague games. To start it off, the Kansas City T-Bones host the New Jersey Jackals.

Will Savage (pictured) will not be compared to Bob Gibson or Randy Johnson when it comes to strikeouts, but presuming wins are still most important the Los Angeles Dodgers surely are taking note of the 6-0 record the 27-year-old has posted for Triple-A Albuquerque, NM.

The 2009 Wichita (KS) Wingnuts (American Association) starter, who also worked briefly for Lancaster, PA in the Atlantic League, was moved from the bullpen into the rotation four starts ago for the Isotopes. He has gone 3-0, 3.80 to bring his overall earned run average in the light air of Albuquerque to 3.22.

How nice it is to see that one of the best players to work his way from an Independent beginning to major league stardom has returned to his roots.

Kerry Ligtenberg (pictured), who went from the Minneapolis Loons (North Central and Prairie Leagues) in 1994-95 to a 30-save season (34 opportunities) with the Atlanta Braves in ’98, will be the St. Paul (MN) Saints’ (American Association) pitching coach this summer, replacing Jason Verdugo, the new athletic director at Hamline University.

Will Savage and Scott Rice may not have known each other when they were Independent players, but they have an early start toward becoming quite a pairing with the Los Angeles Dodgers’ top farm club in Albuquerque, NM. Savage is 4-0 for the Isotopes and Rice has four saves with three of them in the same games. It is not exactly a Clayton Kershaw-Javy Guerra situation just yet because Savage had been working out of the bullpen until this week when he allowed just two runs in six innings as the tandem combined give Albuquerque a seventh consecutive victory.

Savage, who spent most of ’09 with Wichita, KS in the American Association and pitched briefly for Lancaster, PA in the Atlantic League, now sports a 2.41 ERA for 18.2 innings

I keep thinking back to the lavish 100-year anniversary party at Fenway Park, and realizing once more how many major league personalities have been a part of Independent Baseball. The Red Sox invited every one of their former players back, and they strolled in from centerfield without introduction.

Among those I spotted who have had Indy connections were these headline-makers: Oil Can Boyd, Bill Buckner, Jose Canseco, Mike Easler, Rich Gedman, Richie Hebner, Roger LaFrancois and Kevin Millar (pictured). Millar, who has been the best player ever to emerge from a start in Independent Baseball (St. Paul Saints) and Pedro Martinez were the leaders in a spontaneous toast to the grand 'ol ballpark

Adam Hamari (pictured) of Marquette, MI, who worked in the Can-Am in 2006, recently got assigned a major league number—he is Number 78—which means the 29-year-old could very well get to work a few major league games before the season is over, and if he continues to grade well with his top-level bosses may be a regular in the bigs within a couple of seasons. He is currently assigned to the International League.

Six more recent graduates of the major league umpire evaluation process were hired this offseason, stated AA Director of Umpires Kevin Winn. Travis Godec and Ben Levin came out of the American Association while James Pattison and Matt Kaintz are awaiting their 2012 assignments as are recent Can-Am League products Nate Caldwell and Derek Moccia.