ESPN sportswriter Bill Simmons saw his latest, The Book of Basketball, top the bestsellers list this week for hardcover nonfiction, leaving millions of sports obsessives almost unreasonably proud of one of their own. Even some cynical bloggers are along for the ride, as evidenced by today’s Will Leitch-penned love letter “Bill Simmons, Establishment,” on Deadspin. It’s touching, in a Judd Apatow sort of way. But it’s also an insightful take on bloggers going mainstream, a subject we’ve touched on before.

In Bill Simmons‘ The Book of Basketball: The NBA According to the Sports Guy you essentially get a 700 page Simmons column, complete with lists of the 96 greatest players of all time, the ten best teams in history and around 1,500 words on how Kobe Bryant compares to Teen Wolf. Nobody knows more about the history of basketball than Bill Simmons.