Team Ruff or Team Fluff?
February 7, 2016 9:54 AM Subscribe
The top 10 similarities between the Super Bowl and Puppy Bowl
THE CHEATING CONTROVERSY
N.F.L. fans and Patriots alike are all still reeling from last year’s Deflategate scandal. Even though its players are innocent, adorable dogs, the Puppy Bowl is not free of scandal. Toporoff warns, “I think you’ll see, with one of the chew toys, there’s an issue. We had to stop down the game, and the ref had to investigate a bit.”
THE PRODUCTION
The Super Bowl is shot over about four hours. The Puppy Bowl is shot over two full days. On the first day, a collection of kittens perform in the kitty halftime show. In this case, perform means sit and stare at the camera, or completely ignore it, along with the spinning feathers, catnip-filled toys, and laser devices set to encourage them to do anything at all...
Animal Planet: Starting lineup
SB Nation: The ultimate Fantasy Puppy Bowl guide, to help you dominate your friends at picking puppies
Animal Planet's Annual Event Supports An Important Cause
Pet adoption resources
Puppy Bowl previously 1, 2
THE CHEATING CONTROVERSY
N.F.L. fans and Patriots alike are all still reeling from last year’s Deflategate scandal. Even though its players are innocent, adorable dogs, the Puppy Bowl is not free of scandal. Toporoff warns, “I think you’ll see, with one of the chew toys, there’s an issue. We had to stop down the game, and the ref had to investigate a bit.”
THE PRODUCTION
The Super Bowl is shot over about four hours. The Puppy Bowl is shot over two full days. On the first day, a collection of kittens perform in the kitty halftime show. In this case, perform means sit and stare at the camera, or completely ignore it, along with the spinning feathers, catnip-filled toys, and laser devices set to encourage them to do anything at all...
Animal Planet: Starting lineup
SB Nation: The ultimate Fantasy Puppy Bowl guide, to help you dominate your friends at picking puppies
Animal Planet's Annual Event Supports An Important Cause
Pet adoption resources
Puppy Bowl previously 1, 2
As much as I love the Puppy Bowl (and I dearly do!), I fear it has become a victim of it's own genius and success. Year-after-year, they've done little things to polish the production and add extra off-field "not puppies running around" fluff to where last year's broadcast had so little actual Puppy Bowl action as to be not worth watching.
It's a simple concept, guys. Puppies! Playing together! For hours! You have to actually work to screw that up.
posted by Thorzdad at 11:12 AM on February 7, 2016 [16 favorites]
It's a simple concept, guys. Puppies! Playing together! For hours! You have to actually work to screw that up.
posted by Thorzdad at 11:12 AM on February 7, 2016 [16 favorites]
Super Bowl anthem-singing tangent: "It’s the sort of note that led to all those stories about Mariah Carey CDs opening people’s garage doors."
posted by colie at 11:22 AM on February 7, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by colie at 11:22 AM on February 7, 2016 [1 favorite]
Puppy number 48 is a 16 week old female Havanese named Andy Cohen, and the world is occasionally a lovely place.
posted by ChuraChura at 11:38 AM on February 7, 2016 [3 favorites]
posted by ChuraChura at 11:38 AM on February 7, 2016 [3 favorites]
Is this the year we'll finally be able to watch Puppy Bowl online? Sources are... unclear.
posted by phooky at 1:28 PM on February 7
Here you go!
And click here for Kitty Bowl live stream.
posted by magstheaxe at 12:39 PM on February 7, 2016 [2 favorites]
posted by phooky at 1:28 PM on February 7
Here you go!
And click here for Kitty Bowl live stream.
posted by magstheaxe at 12:39 PM on February 7, 2016 [2 favorites]
Nothing's happening on that Puppy Bowl stream. Last year I remember that you could watch the locker room for free (which is apparently what your link is) but you needed cable for the actual "game."
posted by desjardins at 12:48 PM on February 7, 2016
posted by desjardins at 12:48 PM on February 7, 2016
Never mind, you're screwed either way. They're showing some veterinarian show on the website.
posted by desjardins at 12:59 PM on February 7, 2016
posted by desjardins at 12:59 PM on February 7, 2016
You could also watch the Key and Peele four-hour improv (yeah, it's also an extended Squarespace commercial, but at least it's not GoDaddy amirite)
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 1:43 PM on February 7, 2016
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 1:43 PM on February 7, 2016
The one unpleasant similarity I noticed were a couple of dumb sexist commercials, like the geico tarzan one, but the kittens invading san francisco mostly made up for it.
posted by poffin boffin at 2:15 PM on February 7, 2016
posted by poffin boffin at 2:15 PM on February 7, 2016
The main thing they have in common from my perspective is that the commentators are unbearably annoying.
posted by town of cats at 2:59 PM on February 7, 2016 [2 favorites]
posted by town of cats at 2:59 PM on February 7, 2016 [2 favorites]
I liked the little riff they did on "Deflate-gate." Cute.
posted by Thorzdad at 5:57 PM on February 7, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by Thorzdad at 5:57 PM on February 7, 2016 [1 favorite]
Kitten Bowl was so much better than Puppy Bowl this year.
posted by briank at 6:06 PM on February 7, 2016
posted by briank at 6:06 PM on February 7, 2016
Wasn't PB originally longer than an hour? I seem to recall it running almost as long as the football game back when it started.
posted by Thorzdad at 6:56 PM on February 7, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by Thorzdad at 6:56 PM on February 7, 2016 [1 favorite]
It's 2 hours, but they rerun it until 4am (CST).
posted by SisterHavana at 9:31 PM on February 7, 2016
posted by SisterHavana at 9:31 PM on February 7, 2016
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Also it looks like the puppy bowl's extrapolated surrealist endgame, the Fish Bowl, is back this year.
posted by phooky at 10:28 AM on February 7, 2016 [8 favorites]