ERIE, Pa. — A minor league baseball team in Western Pennsylvania drew big crowds and lots of attention on Saturday night.
The Erie SeaWolves, a Double-A affiliate of the Detroit Tigers, became the Erie Moon Mammoths for one day only.
This quirky rebrand comes after the team was selected by comedian John Oliver and his team at HBO’s Last Week Tonight for the surprise transformation.
Mayor Joe Schember even issued a proclamation, declaring July 19, 2025, Moon Mammoth Day, to celebrate the occasion, NBC News affiliate WICU reports.
"The inherent eccentricity of minor league baseball is something that we felt a real affinity with," Oliver said. "The more we looked into it the more we thought there might be fun to have. And, once we put out the request for ‘who would be down for rebranding,’ it was not surprising but edifying to see just how many teams went ‘yeah we’d be down for that.’"
The SeaWolves had no say on their rebrand name or logo. The Last Week Tonight team dug into Erie’s history to pick Moon Mammoths, a name inspired by the 1991 discovery of woolly mammoth remains in a local lake.
Oliver threw out the first pitch at the game, which drew a record-setting crowd of more than 7,000 fans.
The SeaWolves will don the Mammoths’ branding three more times throughout the summer.
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