Publishers Marketplace reports another blogger book deal, although this one hits close to home:

Deadspin editor Will Leitch's THE BALLAD OF RON MEXICO: Why ESPN, yellow bracelets, fantasy leagues, and yes, bloggers, have ruined sports for real fans and how we can get them back, a humorous call to arms in which the ringmaster of the influential sports blog punctures today's out of control jockocracy and offers a blueprint how to put the fun back into our games, to David Hirshey at Harper, in a pre-empt, by Kate Lee of ICM.

We couldn't be more thrilled for Will. Mediabistro's Galleycat, on the other hand, calls shenanigans, noting that Hirshey writes a weekly column on Deadspin. We're less inclined to see this as a conflict of interest than a combination of people who already know each other using that relationship to further their respective ambitions, but we can see how a high-profile blogging gig on Deadspin might induce someone to cough up a publishing contract. In related news, Alex Blagg has totally signed us up to write a couple of posts on the Best Week Ever blog.

Some pre-empts require little explanation [GalleyCat]