Homer at the Bat

] In several cases, the writers were unable to get the player who was their first choice. The two players who turned down the chance to guest star were Ryne Sandberg and Carlton Fisk.

All of the players were cooperative except for José Canseco, who was intimidating. He disliked his original part and insisted it be rewritten, and the writers grudgingly] When asked about his part by the San Jose Mercury, he responded, "that was 100 years ago," hung up the phone, and did not answer any of the paper's subsequent calls for an interview about his guest spot.

Ken Griffey, Jr. did not understand his line "there's a party in my mouth and everyone's invited" and got quite frustrated when he was recording it. He was directed by Mike Reiss, and his father Ken Griffey, Sr. was also present, trying to coach his son. Roger Clemens, who made his own chicken noises, was directed by Jeff Martin, as was Wade Boggs. Mike Reiss directed most of the other players. Mike Scioscia accepted his guest spot in "half a second," while Ozzie Smith has stated that he would like to guest star again "so [he] can get out [of the Springfield Mystery spot] ." Don Mattingly, who was forced to shave off his "sideburns" by Mr. Burns during the episode, would later have an actual "haircut controversy", while he was playing for the New York Yankees. The coaching staff forced him to cut his long hair, and was briefly dropped from the team line-up for not doing so. Many people believed the joke in the episode to be a reference to the incident, but "Homer at the Bat" was recorded a year before it happened. [] Former executive producer Sam Simon and current showrunner Al Jean named it as their favorite episode. [cite news|title=Insiders name their favorite episodes|accessdate=2008-02-19|date=2007-05-20|page=10F|author=Neal Justin|publisher=Star Tribune] [cite news|title=Fans' knowledge floors show's top executive|accessdate=2008-02-19|date=2001-05-29|page=8D|author=Patrick Kampert|publisher=Sun-Sentinel] Regular cast members Harry Shearer and Julie Kavner disliked the episode because of its focus on the guest stars and its surreal tone. They were particularly annoyed by the Mattingly sideburns joke.Warren Martyn and Adrian Wood, the authors of the book "I Can't Believe It's a Bigger and Better Updated Unofficial Simpsons Guide", praised the episode, calling it "a great episode because the accidents that befall the pro players are so funny." Chris Turner, the author of the book "Planet Simpson", said that the episode was the indication that "the Golden Age [of the show] had arrived." [cite book| last = Turner| first = Chris| title = | pages = pg. 39| id = ISBN 0-679-31318-4] Nate Meyers gave the episode four and a half out of five, stating "the script makes great use of the baseball superstars, giving each of them a strong personality and plenty of pep (the highlight has to be Mattingly's clash with Mr. Burns)." [cite web|url=http://www.digitallyobsessed.com/showreview.php3?ID=6129|title=The Simpsons: The Complete Third Season|accessdate=2007-08-03|author=Nate Meyers|date=2004-06-23|publisher=Digitally Obssessed] Colin Jacobson disliked the episode: "when ["Homer at the Bat"] originally aired, I didn't like it. While I've warmed up to the show slightly over the last decade, I still think it's generally weak, and I'd definitely pick it as Season Three's worst." [cite web|url=http://www.dvdmg.com/simpsonsseasonthree.shtml|title=The Simpsons: The Complete Third Season (1991)|accessdate=2007-08-03|date=2003-08-21|author=Colin Jacobson|publisher=DVD Movie Guide]

"Entertainment Weekly" placed the episode fifteenth on their top 25 "The Simpsons" episodes list, noting it was "early proof that "The Simpsons" could juggle a squad of guest stars without giving the family short shrift." [cite web|url=http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,417748_3,00.html|title=The Family Dynamic|accessdate=2007-08-03|date=2003-01-29|publisher=Entertainment Weekly] It was placed third on AskMen.com's "Top 10: Simpsons Episodes" list, Rich Weir called it "one of the show's more memorable moments" and "effective as it combines a slew of guest stars with some hilarious material for Homer." [cite web|url=http://uk.askmen.com/toys/top_10_60/64c_top_10_list.html|title=Top 10: Simpsons Episodes|accessdate=2007-08-03|author=Weir, Rich|publisher=Askmen.com] The entire episode was placed first on ESPN.com's list of the "Top 100 Simpsons sport moments", released in 2004. Greg Collins, the author of the list, gave great praise of the episode. He stated that this is the "king of all sports episodes, and perhaps the greatest "Simpsons" episode ever." A friend of Collins later met guest star Mike Scioscia and told him the he thought his guest spot was the best thing Scioscia had ever done, he responded "Thanks, I think". [cite web|author=Collins, Greg|title=The Simpsons Got Game|publisher=ESPN.com|date=2004-01-23|url=http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page3/story?page=simpsons/part4|accessdate=2007-03-29] Eric Reinagel, Brian Moritz and John Hill of "Press & Sun-Bulletin" named the episode the fourth best in the show's history, [cite news|title=WOO-HOO! A look at the 10 best 'Simpsons' episodes ever - just in time for the new movie|accessdate=2008-02-19|date=2007-07-07|page=8E|author=Eric Reinagel, Brian Moritz, John Hill|publisher=Press & Sun-Bulletin] and a journalist for "The Toronto Star" named Homer's conversation with Darryl Strawberry as the "greatest conversation of all time, involving the word yes". [cite news|title=The greatest conversation of all time, involving the word 'yes'|accessdate=2008-02-19|date=2006-02-28|page=D02|publisher=The Toronto Star]

IGN.com ranked the baseballers' performances as the seventeenth best guest appearance in the show's history, calling "each of these appearances was hilarious, making this a classic episode." [cite web|url=http://uk.tv.ign.com/articles/730/730566p2.html|title=Top 25 Simpsons Guest Appearances|accessdate=2007-08-03|author=Goldman, Eric; Iverson, Dan; Zoromski, Brian|publisher=IGN] Also Gruesimpson of IGN called it "A GREAT episode, with an un-witty sideburn joke, but the episode makes up for that!" The Phoenix.com praised the performances of each of the guest stars, but Darryl Strawberry, who they put in the fifth position, was the only one to make their "Top 20 guest stars" list. [cite web|url=http://www.thephoenix.com/Article.aspx?id=7123&page=2|title=The Simpsons 20 best guest voices of all time|date=2006-03-29|accessdate=2007-08-03|publisher=The Phoenix.com]

The episode has helped to save several people's lives. During the scene in which Homer chokes on a donut, a poster explaining how the Heimlich Maneuver works is on the wall behind him. In May 1992, Chris Bencze was able to save his brother's life by performing the Heimlich Maneuver on him, having seen it in the episode, [cite news|title=Mom says 'Simpsons' saved her son's life|accessdate=2008-02-19|date=1992-05-22|page=C2|publisher=The Pantagraph|author=Associated Press] and in December 2007 Aiden Bateman was able to save his friend Alex Hardy's life by recalling the same. [cite news|title=The Express: Boy saves pal's life . . . by listening to Homer|accessdate=2008-02-19|date=2007-12-15|publisher=The Express|author=Paul Jeeves]

References

External links

* [http://www.thesimpsons.com/episode_guide/0317.htm "Homer at the Bat"] at The Simpsons.com
*snpp capsule|8F13
* [http://www.tv.com/episode/1337/summary.html "Homer at the Bat"] at TV.com
* [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0701114/ "Homer at the Bat"] at the Internet Movie Database