Know That Owner: Steve Oelheim

Hi everyone, and thanks for stopping in to enjoy the newly revamped Mordecai blog! It’s time for the second installment in our “Meet the Owner” series… or in this case, “Meet the Commish”!

I’m on a first-name basis with a lot of the owners in Mordecai, but for those of you who don’t know, my name is Steve Oelheim, aka smoelheim on WhatIfSports. I am an original member of Mordecai, but not its original commissioner. The league founder bailed after the first season, and when nobody else stepped up, I decided to do what I could to keep the league running. It was a great choice, as this world is filled with great people and dedicated HBD owners. I expect to be here for a long, long time.

Outside of HBD, I am 38 years old, married for the last 8, and have two kids who really keep me running. When I’m not chasing them around the house (or the park, or the zoo, or the kids museum, or wherever), I like to escape for a round of golf in the warmer months, and we have season tickets to the local hockey team (the Rochester Americans of the AHL, hockey’s “AAA” league) in the colder months. I’m not real good at sitting around the house doing nothing.

I was born, raised, and still live in Rochester, NY. I work as a Sr Programmer Analyst for the #3 Company to Work For in America (http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/bestcompanies/2010/index.html). It started out as a part time job when I was 16, and I’m still working for the same company today. How many 38 year olds can say they’ve got 22 years of seniority with their current employer?

I grew up as a Yankees fan (primarily because my first little league team was the Yankees), and the first game I ever specifically remember watching was the Yankees/Red Sox 1-game playoff in 1978, when Bucky Dent hit the infamous HR. I still remember running around the house celebrating. But a cancelled World Series, the length of the games, the “steroids/wound ball era”, and lack of a salary cap to level the playing field have all turned me off to the game. I find it completely unwatchable anymore. But I DO miss the statistics aspect of it, because I’m a huge numbers guy. That’s what brought me to WIS so long ago!

My dream WIS game would be Hockey Dynasty, but I’m not holding my breath for it anytime soon. I’m sure that a pro football game is higher on WIS’ priority list. If either of these games ever comes true, I’ll have a team in each, but will always leave my Mordecai team as my one remaining HBD team.

I think this was a great idea by rbedwell, and am glad that there was interest in resurrecting the Mordecai blog. I look forward to reading more owner bios in the coming weeks and months. And if anyone has other content they would like to submit, please talk to myself or Ralph, we’d be happy to publish submissions by everyone!