Hub Arkush positions Pro Football Weekly to shine in digital age
BY DAVID SWEET dsweet@pioneerlocal.com January 10, 2012 3:56PM
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Updated: January 10, 2012 5:30PM
A father’s untimely death. An FBI inquiry. An NFL work stoppage. Bankruptcy.
Hub Arkush has endured obstacles the size of William “The Refrigerator” Perry at Pro Football Weekly (PFW), the national newspaper co-founded by his father, Arthur, in 1967. But a big investment in digital media — including $130,000 for video equipment at its Riverwoods headquarters, which helps the creation of three dozen Internet videos a week during football season — is turning into a touchdown for America’s largest publication devoted solely to pro football.
In the past 18 months, Pro Football Weekly has spent more than $2 million on digital media, prompted in part by investor GateHouse Media. Arkush counts more than 17 million video views a month from its Web offerings, and a number of apps — Pro Football Insider, Fantasy Football, and best NFL Draft — have been created.
“For the first time in 30 years, we’re ahead of everyone,” said Arkush, publisher/editor of Pro Football Weekly. “ESPN and Yahoo! want to partner with us.”
back when pro football games were mainly contested in baseball stadiums, Pro Football Weekly also served as a trend-setter. The company created the first computerized set of NFL statistics in 1976. it had previously published the first independent NFL draft rankings in 1970.
“For 20 years we were the only ones doing draft rankings,” Arkush recalled. “During early ESPN coverage of the draft, you’d see people holding on to our magazine.”
Despite his father’s position, there was no guarantee Arkush would join the family business. The Deerfield High graduate attended Southern Illinois University for a spell, where he ended up “a third- or fourth-string football player.” he transferred to the University of Michigan and, after graduating in 1976, considered law school. Instead, he found himself working at Michigan’s animal medicine spot.
“I had always loved animals. I was offered a job at the San Diego Zoo,” he said.
Ultimately, he decided to join Pro Football Weekly as a circulation manager, and he did end up focusing on animals — Bears, Lions, Bengals and others.
“We were a five- or six-man shop. I had no formal journalism training, but I was an English major,” recounted Arkush.
But in 1979, his father passed away unexpectedly while jogging. Hub’s brother, Dan Arkush, took over editorial, while Hub donned the publisher’s hat.
“We didn’t know what we were doing. I was 26,” Hub said.
Role of Al Davis
The principal investor in Pro Football Weekly then was Oakland Raiders owner Al Davis, which some considered a conflict of interest, given the publication covered the Raiders among 27 other NFL teams at the time. Los Angeles Rams owner Carroll Rosenbloom was an investor too, but he died under mysterious circumstances a few weeks after Hub’s father.
“The business always struggled. The business always was undercapitalized,” said Arkush, though he noted his father cleaned up the lion’s share of debt before he died.
In fact, the publication made money the first year after his father’s death, mainly from a circulation promotion. But soon, the 1982 NFL players’ strike nearly decimated the company.
“The 50-60-day work stoppage just killed us,” Arkush said. “I was begging our vendors to be patient.”
“They had 204 publications, and most were glossy. We were a weekly tabloid,” Arkush said.
Early in the 21st century, Arkush bought the magazine back from Primedia and raised $1 million in two weeks from private investors and from Liberty Publishing, Pro Football Weekly’s printer. The magazine had started doing better on the advertising side, procuring spots from offshore gaming companies. those ads, in fact, represented more than 50 percent of ad revenue.
But in September, 2003, an FBI agent appeared unannounced.
‘Cease and desist’
“He said, ‘You have done business with offshore gaming companies. You need to cease and desist,’” Arkush said. “We said we weren’t doing anything illegal. We gave them a schedule to phase them out after 18 months. They said we would have to cease and desist. our lawyer said we would win in 10-12 years, and we’d be bankrupted three times over.” Pro Football Weekly jettisoned the ads.
Today PFW attracts more than 100,000 loyal readers, from league executives in New York City to football fans on the West Coast, from sports bettors to fantasy players. Lake Forest resident Don Pierson, who covered the pro football beat for the Chicago Tribune for 20 years, always looked forward to the weekly.
“It was indispensable,” he said. “To my knowledge, it’s the only publication that has every pro football statistic and every resource you would need. I don’t think you can cover pro football without it.”
Pierson has also been impressed by the company’s annual college football draft guide (Pro Football Weekly LLC also publishes a fantasy football magazine). before the 2007 draft, Pierson read about LSU quarterback JaMarcus Russell, who would become the No. 1 overall pick.
“Nolan Nawrocki wrote that he wouldn’t touch (LSU quarterback) JaMarcus Russell with a 10-foot pole,” Pierson recalled. “He was the only one writing that.” after a weak career, Russell is now out of football.
As Arkush worked to keep Pro Football Weekly viable over the decades, he expanded into media beyond print. Pro Football Weekly on TV is celebrating its 25th season, and it now runs three times a week on Fox Sports Net and Comcast Sports Net (Arkush writes shows as well as serving as its on-air analyst and co-host). Pro Football Weekly on Radio, started in 1987, is broadcast on more than 100 stations in the United States.
on his own, Arkush also works Sunday-night NFL games as a sideline reporter for Westwood one radio. he serves as an NFL analyst for WSCR-AM in Chicago and spent many hours on air recently dissecting the dismissal of Bears General Manager Jerry Angelo. Speaking of which, many remember Arkush in the Bears’ broadcast booth, where he became a color commentator in 1987. he broadcast scores of games featuring the Lake Forest-based franchise before being removed in favor of a two-man crew on WBBM-AM in 2005.
“I grew up a Bears fan. To end up in their broadcast booth was a very unique thing,” Arkush said. “Dick Butkus and I were broadcast partners. What’s cooler than that? I know how lucky I’ve been.’
Today he counts among his blessings working with his family (along with the end of the 2011 NFL lockout). his 29-year-old son, Arthur, covers the AFC South and serves as the distribution manager for PFW. his two other children, Billy and Taylor, worked on the annual draft magazine years ago, stuffing envelopes and putting labels on. Brother Dan is an executive editor, while another brother, Rick, is the tabloid’s statistician. Hub met his wife, Candace, on the job.
“Easily the most fulfilling part for me is the way my family has been involved,” said Arkush. “This is the ultimate family business story.”
And the future? Arkush is clearly excited about the prospects of digital media. But there is one part he hasn’t embraced.
“I don’t tweet,” he said. “My people are all over me. from my perspective, there’s more bad than good in that world. But I’ll lose that battle.”
