Pictured: (l-r) David Frei, John O'Hurley -- Host John O'Hurley is joined by Analyst David Frei to comment at THE NATIONAL DOG SHOW PRESENTED BY PURINA -- Photo by: Francine Daveta/NBC
Veteran dog show judge, charity fundraiser and author David Frei is the on-camera analyst for the annual National Dog Show Presented by Purina (motto: Dog before master) with host John O’Hurley on NBC this Thanksgiving.
Entertainment Heartbeat talked to David Frei as he was preparing for his color analysis of the 2000 dogs that will be competing this year in Oaks, Pennsylvania.
Frei is considered America’s foremost authority of the sport, so how good has he become at spotting a contending dog at these shows. “I think I have an eye for it,” Frei says. “The great thing about shows like this is that this is one of the few times all year where all the great dogs are at the same place at the same time…they don’t always come head to head, it’s nice to see them all together, and at that point in time you’ve got to be judging the dogs on the day, you’ve got seven great dogs in that final lineup for Best In Show, who are you going to pick? It almost doesn’t matter, close your eyes and point and you’re going to get a good dog. So, you have to know what you’re doing, you have to understand your breed and see who’s having the best day.”
How differently will this years’ competition be from previous shows? “It’s always a bit of a surprise when we see dogs we haven’t seen before, and sometimes that happens just because of geography, with the National Dog Show we’ve got dogs coming in from all over the country, so it’s nice to see some of these dogs that have been winning, that you’ve read about, so hopefully there will be some of everything; you’ll get the great dogs from everywhere…that’s what makes it fun every year, we do the same thing every year we have different players.”
Pictured: Dogs compete for the coveted "Best In Show" at THE NATIONAL DOG SHOW PRESENTED BY PURINA -- Photo by: Francine Daveta/NBC
Stories are legend that the very best dogs come from pounds (or strays from the streets), so what are the advantages of paying considerably more for a pure-bred dog? “There’s a lot of things involved with pure-bred dogs and it’s not to promote pure-breed dogs at the expense of mixed-breed dogs or shelter dogs for adoption but the great thing about pure-breed dogs is their predictability; I know this little three-pound ball of fluff is going to grow up to be an 85 pound Akita, or an 8 pound Pomeranian, and I know what my lifestyle is and I know what is important to me, so the best thing about them is that there are no surprises, you know what this dog is going to be when it grows up. They’re all cute little balls of fluff when they’re all four, five, six months old but they’re going to be living with you for to, 12, 15 years as an adult, so you have to be prepared for that and with a pure-breed dog you know what’s going to happen with that, and the other thing that happens with pure-bred dogs in dealing with a responsible breeder is that you buy that breeder as much as you buy the dog, and if you have some challenges with that breed, the breeder can help you, if you have a problem and you need to find the dog a new home he will help you do that or even take the dog back.”
There exist several kennel clubs (some obscure) with impressive-sounding names and we needed to know what Frei thought about them. “Well, of course I’m a great believer in the American Kennel Club as the protector of pure-bred dogs along with great clubs like the Westminster Kennel Club and the Kennel Club of Philadelphia that the things we do are done with the dogs in mind whether it’s promoting heath research in them, promoting their care and welfare, policing the breeders that are involved with these dogs and selling them as pure-breed dogs…I can’t speak for what the other one’s do but I can’t believe they are as good at it as the AKC is.”
Frei has two dogs of his own, a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel named Angel and a Brittany named Grace, and while they are close friends (and family members) they are also working dogs. “They dabble in the show world but their most important contribution is as working therapy dogs for my Angel On A Leash charity and for me and for the people that they visit they’re the stars of my new book called Angel On A Leash and they do wonderful things for people in need every single day.”
We hear much today about a new category of miniature dog from breeds that were never known before as small in stature, and Frei has much to say about the new fashion. “It’s one thing to have a dog that’s petite for its breed, but to select for that you’re probably going to get yourself in trouble, like with tea cups, tea cups are nothing more than dogs that have been selected down in size and the smaller you make them the more likely they are to have issues and responsible dog breeders of toy breeds will tell you that they’re not a good thing, there really is no such thing as a tea cup, it’s just selected down in size which can create health problems for the dogs in their lives. So, if you’re getting a dog that’s small in the breed, the runt in the litters, so to speak, that’s okay, my Cavalier, Angel, she’s very petite but she’s not bred down intentionally she just happened to be the small dog in the litter, and that’s okay.”
David Frei is such good company but we could hear the collective voice of a couple-thousand barking contenders in the background. That meant that NBC needed Frei‘s unique expertise to make entertaining sense out of the abstruse world of show dogs.
For more, go to Angel On A Leash.org.