Joe Namath, Roy Firestone, and Mike Judge guest-starred in the episode. In a July 28, 1997 interview with USA Today, Mike Scully said that Namath's cameo was "an homage to all those '60s sitcoms where an athlete would drop in on the young kid (in this case, Bart) who's having problems and give him some great advice to help him out and say things like, 'Sure, sports is fun but school is great, too.'" Mike Judge's appearance was a cross-promotion for his animated series King of the Hill, which followed The Simpsons on Fox's Sunday schedule in 1997. Other King of the Hill characters (Hank's niece Luanne, Hank's wife Peggy, Hank's son Bobby, and Hank's friends, Dale Gribble, Bill Dauterive, and Boomhauer) were present for this scene, which depicts them as real characters within the Simpsons'
