Face to Face with Peter McGough

**Musclepapa John** · 12-10-2014, 07:58 AM

McGough is making the complete transition from reporter to youtube broadcaster now with the announced series Face to Face with Peter McGough.
From a business perspective I'm trying to weigh out the pros and cons and I see more pros than cons from the perspective of using Peter as a broadcaster dishing out interviews regularly for this series as for instance Dave Palumbo would. All Peter does is play by play aside from interviews when at a show versus Dave who is overseeing all site operations including doing photo tagging running his supplement line, conversing directly with promoters, potential new sponsors and doing interviews along with assisting his photographer and videographer where necessary.
The view counts for any such series won't justify independent production in the sense that to send Peter strictly to get a few interviews of the celeb big name guys as the series is billed. If in fact Peter was to interview everyone as Dave does as the RxMuscle/Species CEO that would make more sense.
Better comparison would be Mr. Blechman doing the interviews himself and cut out all the guys like McGough whose celebrity as the Edward R. Morrow of the sport will wear off quickly as shown by the view counts if the series is followed from a business perspective versus fan worship view.
Dave can have a dozen different audio/video programs as they are his dream child and he produces them himself with Johnny. MD will have half a dozen involved in costly production that won't generate any better numbers and certainly not the sort of numbers that warrant a AMI-Weider sort of major print mag advertising account value.
I'd think Peter would do better selling ads for the title and or justifying to them why they should pay a premium for print ads and show coverage versus broadcasting on youtube.

**Musclepapa John** · 12-10-2014, 08:19 AM

I can't help but wonder what the point of a senior editor position is when most every article McGough puts out has spelling or other errors. Does he oversee the grammar and spelling of Ron Harris their sponsored athlete's shadow writer? Increasingly the shrinking magazine is becoming merely a platform for advertising their supplement line not objective coverage of the sport as a whole. McGough has written online diatribes about bikini competitors and that division as a whole. That's rather like being hired to cover the NFL and ranting during coverage that soccer is better.
Where someone like McGough is employed as a celebrity figurehead versus doing grunt work to add to the bottomline in competition with Rx, which is ever present in their minds eye it just proves to be a failure day after day as the publication shrinks further and further along with their advertising base.

**Sandwich** · 12-10-2014, 08:22 AM

I agree it should be "all hands on deck" when a small business is failing. Peter could certainly do more with his tenure in the industry.

I did think it was a good idea for him to transition to video. As good of a writer as Peter is, I do not believe MD's (dwindling) fan base would prefer to read over watching a video. Just a sign of the times. Why would they?

That said, while the video transition is a step in the right direction, the trailer didn't seem all that interesting. Peter takes himself and his role too seriously at times. After all, mens pro bb is just a supped-up "thong war." He might as well let loose.

**Curt James** · 12-10-2014, 08:39 AM

I love you, man, but you have a serious hard-on for McGough. He, along with Bob Bonham, saved the Ms. Olympia (with help from his Weider budget) in 1999. He's one of the top writers covering the sport, a historian, and I wish him the best with his new show.

**Curt James** · 12-10-2014, 08:43 AM

X2 on the kudos to Johnny #LETSDOTHIS Styles and Dave Palumbo.

**mackdaddy567** · 12-10-2014, 11:24 AM

I'm interested!

**Maniacal** · 12-10-2014, 01:03 PM

IMO, Peter McGough, and especially his then counterpart at FLEX, Julian Schmidt, were the best bodybuilding writers/historians of all time.

McGough's ability to infuse wit, historical perspective and anecdotal nuances into his writing made pretty much every article he ever penned a pleasure to read.

No one today, comes close to matching him.

**MITM** · 12-10-2014, 04:41 PM

Peter is a good friend.

**Musclepapa John** · 12-10-2014, 08:07 PM

While video might seem new and flashy when you can count the views so easily as they will be housed on youtube it seems doomed to fail. How much money is it worth to produce a chatty video of 5-10 minutes long when the most viewed vids are about one minute as most people interested will watch from their office on Monday. Short ones are the most popular because of course people won't click on long ones at work because they know they can't watch that long as the boss might catch them. Contest photos are where the view counts and traffic building for bodybuilding sites still is. Youtube is bombarded with huge numbers of new videos everyday. Its not a growing market, but just the opposite.

As for the all hands on deck; I agree. However, Peter seems to be considered a celeb as even Adina and David Baye fashion themselves. While they can be knowledgeable the legit base of bodybuilding viewership wants to see muscle not hear people talk about it.
Team MD is overrun with peeps that can ratchet up a forum thread covering a show built on improved SEO on the website backend and then afterwards go to dinner and get drunk on the bosses dime while posting their selfies with bodybuilding celebs, paparazzi pics of the back of The Rock's head etc. I'd rather marvel to see them shaking hands and announcing at each show some new sponsor for their show coverage, etc. That would be really amazing.

Originally Posted by Sandwich

I agree it should be "all hands on deck" when a small business is failing. Peter could certainly do more with his tenure in the industry.

I did think it was a good idea for him to transition to video. As good of a writer as Peter is, I do not believe MD's (dwindling) fan base would prefer to read over watching a video. Just a sign of the times. Why would they?

That said, while the video transition is a step in the right direction, the trailer didn't seem all that interesting. Peter takes himself and his role too seriously at times. After all, mens pro bb is just a supped-up "thong war." He might as well let loose.

**Musclepapa John** · 12-10-2014, 08:15 PM

lol, McGough challenged me after I criticized him for his lambasting of the Brazil Pro judging with his noting if I could do better to do so. As I stated yeah along with taking that shows photos & videos and doing gym shoots with Hide & Gaspari, etc I should go ahead and do the play by play too. One man show. I respect his knowledge as much as I respect that of Steve Wennerstrum and that's in the context of being a historian not the head guy at a modern multi-media entity considering he neither shoots photos or videos and as he claims can judge a show better as with Brazil than the guys sitting there including me that provided him the photos and video. Current day requirements of Senior Editors at serious publishing houses requires more than a knowledge of the history of your subject matter. Technical skills and other modern accouterments are key in landing such positions.

Originally Posted by Curt James

I love you, man, but you have a serious hard-on for McGough. He, along with Bob Bonham, saved the Ms. Olympia (with help from his Weider budget) in 1999. He's one of the top writers covering the sport, a historian, and I wish him the best with his new show.

**Musclepapa John** · 12-11-2014, 06:01 PM

Originally Posted by ChristianDuque

Peter is a good friend.

Name dropper.

**Musclepapa John** · 12-16-2014, 10:23 PM

NEW ADDITION OUT!!!
McGough and the hardest working man in bodybuilding!
14face2face-branch-warren.jpg

**John Hansen** · 12-18-2014, 10:29 AM

Originally Posted by Maniacal

IMO, Peter McGough, and especially his then counterpart at FLEX, Julian Schmidt, were the best bodybuilding writers/historians of all time.

McGough's ability to infuse wit, historical perspective and anecdotal nuances into his writing made pretty much every article he ever penned a pleasure to read.

No one today, comes close to matching him.

I agree! Peter is the best writer in the industry, bar none. Like you said, he has the experience and the wit to write better than anyone else. I thought the interview with Branch was very well done.