MARIETTA, GA. — With cheers from his private cabinet of adoring (and intoxicated) sports and political nuts echoing throughout the Radical Georgia Moderate War Room, Rusty announced today there would be a 2005 iteration of his popular NCAA football picks contest.

“It’s a great opportunity for my real-life and Internet friends to drive up the traffic on my Web site,” he said before swigging delicious bourbon from a plastic flask marked with an Orange Power T [the University of Tennessee logo - Ed].

“And there’s gonna be an actual prize this year rookie beeotches!” he added before falling off his bar stool. When asked what the prize would be, he started to climb back up his bar stool and said, “That’s what marketing types refer to as a teaser. It builds The Hype surrounding an event.”

Rusty said he always uses improper capitalizations when he speaks. That habit is rumored to stem from his delusions of grandeur.

“Ben Franklin did it, so why not me?” he said, chortling and letting out a breath flammable enough to blow up the upper deck at Neyland Stadium had some dumbass lit a match within 500 feet of it.

What made his contest successful last year, said Politics 101 Web mistress Mae, was a lower entrance barrier than other similar contests.

“It’s not, like, other, like, contests, where you, like, have to bet against the, like, spread,” Mae said.

Its mechanics are simple: Rusty posts a game schedule for all top 25 teams accompanied by Las Vegas odds. In the comments section, players write down games where they want to pick against the odds. Every game where a player chooses the winning team with or against the odds counts for 1 point. Whomever has accumulated the most points at the end of the year wins.

“If a Georgia grad can do it, anybody can,” said Jen, Web mistress of Audacity, who won last year’s contest.

There are two changes to the format this year, Rusty said.

Last year’s contest was based around the Associated Press Top 25 poll. Since AP will not be factored into the Bowl Championship Series standings this year, Rusty decided to switch to the ESPN/USA Today poll.

“The polls are bullshit anyway, but what else can a school’s athletic department measure its dick against?” Rusty asked rhetorically. “People need defined boundaries of cocksmanship, even if they are superficial.”

The other departure from last year is bowl games will be integrated into the regular contest since demand for a second set of picks was low last year.

There’s no entry fee to enter the contest. A full set of rules and information about the prize to be offered will be posted tomorrow along with another special surprise wager opportunity just for bloggers who attended the University of Georgia.