This game features the Mariners and Angels, two real-life baseball teams. But that was never the plan. The Zuckers and Abrahams, three Wisconsinites, hoped for

This game features the Mariners and Angels, two real-life baseball teams. But that was never the plan. The Zuckers and Abrahams, three Wisconsinites, hoped for some hometown flair. “We wanted the Brewers,” David Zucker said. “We applied to MLB and they said you have to take the Mariners. … I think they were trying to help that franchise. That was a weak franchise (at the time) and must’ve been weaker than the Brewers.” I doubt it was in any way deliberate, but there's another angle here. MLB was in a phase of expansion in the 1960s. Two teams were added in 1961 (in the American League), two in 1962 (National League), and plans were in place to add four more -- two in each league -- in two groups. The National League would gain two new teams in 1969 (Montréal and San Diego), and the American League would gain two new teams in 1971. The 1971 expansion would add the Seattle Pilots and the Kansas City Royals, with the Royals being a replacement for the former Kansas City Athletics, who relocated to Oakland after the 1967 season. But Missouri Senator Stuart Symington didn't want Kansas City to go three full seasons without a local team, so the AL expansion was moved up, and the Kansas City Royals and Seattle Pilots began play in 1969 instead. Seattle was nowhere near ready for such an accelerated schedule; they played in a decrepit and poorly-converted minor-league stadium, and the team was disastrously bad and had trouble with finances. The Pilots' ownership filed for bankruptcy protection shortly before the 1970 season was scheduled to begin. The team ended up being bought by Bud Selig, who immediately relocated them to Milwaukee, where they still play as the Brewers. Seattle eventually got a permanent MLB franchise in another round of expansion in 1977, when the Seattle Mariners and Toronto Blue Jays began play. But there is still a feeling among baseball fans that the rush to push the 1971 expansion up two years, and the dealings in the offseason after 1969, resulted in Milwaukee "stealing" Seattle's original major-league team. So having Milwaukee get its baseball spotlight stolen by Seattle was arguably poetic justice. Bud Selig, incidentally, went on to become MLB Commissioner, and is a pretty notorious character. His rise from minority owner of an eventually-relocated franchise (the Milwaukee Braves, who moved to Atlanta), to outright owner of the Brewers (née Pilots), to Commissioner, is just full of shady stuff.