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Fresh off a 10-day road trip; ESPN's "The Sports Guy" Bill Simmons is back home in Los Angeles to sign copies of The Book of Basketball tonight at ESPNZone at 5 p.m. Last month we had the chance to talk to Bill, who has been signing his 700 page long NBA book in cities like Washington D.C., Philadelphia, New York, Chicago, Phoenix, San Diego and of course, Boston.
"LA signings are weird. They had the lowest turnout of any city," said Simmons over the phone when we spoke with him just days before hitting the road for his book tour. "I think it’s because there’s so many celebrities out here that I’m like Z-list. I’m on whatever list the guys from "The Ruins" are on. If I go to Providence or somewhere like that, it seems like a much bigger deal."
Bill is kind of a big deal though. He's the executive producer of ESPN's highly praised documentary series 30 For 30, his podcast ,"The B.S. Report," is among the most popular on iTunes and he's got his own page on ESPN.com, "The Sports Guy's World." That's more than what any of those "Real World/Road Rules" cast members can say; well, maybe he's not as big of deal as Tonya. She's quite the accomplished actress.
If you have any of Tonya's work on DVD, and are willing to part with it, be sure to bring it to the signing because Simmons loves gifts. "Last time I was going to do a column about all of the stuff people gave me. I had a whole box of stuff I got from the signings. Then we moved and I have no idea where that box is, it could be in my attic. I don’t know." He adds, "This time around I’m going to do a much better job of making sure I’ll keep track of all the quirky, stupid and funny gifts so I can write something about it after."
If you miss Bill tonight he'll also be signing books in Anaheim at the ESPN Zone on Friday at 4 p.m.
Check out the LAist and Bostonist interviews with "The Sports Guy" from last month.
