ALBANY -- One of the most iconic episodes of The Simpsons will be feted Saturday at the National Baseball Hall of Fame.
The “Homer at the Bat” episode -- in which All-Star baseball players are brought in to play on the company's softball team -- is celebrating its 25th anniversary, and the Hall of Fame in upstate Cooperstown is commemorating the episode during Hall of Fame Classic weekend on Saturday.
The episode first aired on Fox on Feb. 20, 1992, during the show's third season.
"‘Homer at the Bat’ remains as popular today as when the episode aired in 1992," Jeff Idelson, the hall of fame's president, said when the event was announced in February.
The episode features the voices of baseball stars at the time, Ken Griffey Jr., Darryl Strawberry, Jose Canseco, Don Mattingly and others.
Mattingly, who was repeatedly asked on the show by the team's coach and power plant owner Monty Burns to shave his sideburns, was playing for the Yankees at the time. He told the Associated Press he never even watched the full episode.
"I didn't know a whole lot about it, honestly. I knew it was hot and my kids watched it, but I didn't really know that much," he said.
Steve Sax, who won two World Series and was a five-time All-Star, said people ask him about the show as much as his career.
"They don't want to know how it was to hit against Nolan Ryan. They want to know about being on that show," Sax, the former Los Angeles Dodger, told the AP.
Hall of Famers Ozzie Smith and Wade Boggs will be in Cooperstown to talk about being Homer Simpson's teammates. They were two of the nine ringers on the Springfield Nuclear Plant softball squad, only to be befallen by various maladies and accidents.
That leaves Homer to play hero, winning the championship softball game with a walk-off hit-by-pitch.
The roundtable Saturday will be from 9:30 a.m. to 11 a.m. outside the Library entrance to the Hall of Fame in Cooper Park. It will also include some of the show's writers and producers.
During the roundtable, Homer will be “inducted” into the Hall of Fame, followed by a Simpsons-theme display at the museum. The show will also be honored during the Hall of Fame Classic legends game Saturday afternoon at Cooperstown’s historic Doubleday Field.
The Hall of Fame also has a signed copy of "Homer at the Bat" script and a tape of the episode.
For more information about the events, visit www.baseballhall.org.
