Know That Owner: Mike Prime

Greetings and salutations fellow Mordecai owners, my name are Mike Prime, and I go by the handle of trancefusion on WIS. I have been in Mordecai since Season 1 and while I have dabbled in a few other worlds none of them turned out to be as much fun as Mordecai. I originally joined WIS to play the football, hockey and baseball sims but soon came to fall in love with the Dynasty leagues. My first passion was with the Gridiron Dynasty where I played 60 seasons and then retired with a 532-310 record across three worlds. My stint in Hardball Dynasty has not been as successful but I still enjoy it and hope to someday have a contender in my Toronto Jays. Speaking of Toronto, that is where I currently reside; I was born on the East Coast of Canada in a small backwoods town in Nova Scotia but moved to Toronto when I was 18 to get a university education. After I finished school I stayed in Toronto and now work for one of North America’s largest banks as an IT Manager where I have been for over 10 years now. In my current role I manage a group or IT analysts who create and support java environments for the banks development team, we currently support well over 2000 programmers both in Canada and offshore.

When I am not working I like playing vids on the xbox360 (Modern Warfare 2 at the moment), spending time at the cottage with my girlfriend, doing some rock climbing and biking or pounding back some beers with my friends while watching sports. Living in Toronto I am obviously a Blue Jays fan but when I was growing up I always followed the Expos and it was sad to see them leave the Great White North for Washington. I seem to be cursed when it comes to cheering for sports franchises, for example the Jays finished 75-87 last year, the KC Chiefs (my favorite football team) finished 4-12, the Notre Dame Fighting Irish (my favorite college team) finished 6-6 and to top it all off the Toronto Maple Leafs are in the basement at 19-31-11. Basically any team I cheer for sucks right now. On a positive note it can only go up from here!

When it comes to music I have a wide range of tastes but my favorite genre is trance (as you might have expected from my WIS handle), I pretty much enjoy any electronic music that I can dance to at the clubs. Some of my favorite DJ’s would be Paul Van Dyk, Paul Oakenfold, and DJ Tiesto. In my younger years I was very much into metal and hard rock, and then 90’s alternative when I was in university, some of my all time favorites would be GNR, Metallica, Nirvana, Ministry and NiN.

Well that is all I come up with for now, not too exciting but at least it is a glimpse into the life of one of the Mordecai’s originally owners. Good luck to everyone and here is hoping that my Jays can make the playoffs in season 16!!!

Know That Owner: Ben Agnew

My name is Ben Agnew and I am most likely the youngest person in Mordecai. That is, at least to my current knowledge. I recently turned 23 years. Most of you know me as mohawkman and perhaps even a few of you wonder why I use that as a screen name after seeing the picture of me on this blog. To be honest, I’ve never had a mohawk haircut. My alma mater high school uses the Mohawk Indian as a mascot and I suppose I’ve always been proud of the teams I root for. Perhaps this can be further demonstrated in my Mordecai team mascot, the Redhawks. I am currently a senior at Miami University, home of the Roethlisbergers… err, I mean Redhawks.

That is a kind of joke I like to say because many people around here love to talk about Ben Roethlisberger as if he is the only great thing to come out of the school. This Miami is not to be confused with “The U” in Miami, Florida. No, I hail from Oxford, OH where in 1809, Miami University was established… ten years before Florida broke away from Spanish rule, and 36 years before Florida was a state. For the most part, I enjoy going to school here. Robert Frost once claimed Miami was “the most beautiful college there ever was”. All of the buildings are built of red bricks and really do coordinate beautifully. There are also plenty of trees on campus which make for a stunning autumn landscape.

I will graduate this May with a bachelor of arts in psychology and a minor in neuroscience. I enjoy people and love researching the social aspects of human life. My goal is to go back to school at some point and study judgments and decision making. I haven’t applied for grad school yet because to be honest, I’m a little burnt out on school at the moment and I’d like to take a break from it before I make a run for a higher degree. I’m currently throwing my resume around and hoping for a bite in the job market. I know most people say that once you leave school you’ll never go back, but I also know that plenty of grad students are in their 30’s. I feel like I’m pretty focused on going back after a year or two, and that it’s not a matter of “if” but rather “when”.

As for sports, I am a fanatic of everything. I’m a lifelong Reds fan and enjoy baseball in every aspect. Just like most HBD owners, statistics fascinate me. I’m really hoping that in the next few years the Reds can put things together and make a run for the playoffs. As for other sports, Miami hasn’t had a very good football team since Roethlisberger, and basketball has been nothing short of lethargic since Wally Szczerbiak. Instead, most students, including myself, root for the hockey team. Last year we fell a minute short of winning the national championship (ugh! I was there!). This season we are currently ranked #1. Oh, and when it comes to football, I am a die hard Buckeye. Yeah, yeah… the Big Ten is terrible and SEC schools romped them twice in title games. It honestly just makes me appreciate that magical year in ’02 when they did win it all. Championships aren’t everyday and you gotta enjoy them to the fullest when they occur. I feel like they’ll make a run for it next season. I’d love another shot at the SEC. To be the best, you have to beat the best.

*The picture is from my 22nd birthday when my girlfriend smeared icing on my face. She is running away from my revenge to put icing on her face.

Know That Owner: Jacob Maurer

My name is Jacob Maurer, but most people call me Jake. My WIS handle is jemaurer. Mordecai was the first world that I joined and I also have a HBD team in Big Sky Alumni. I am relatively new to HBD (5 seasons) and believe that the best way to learn is to talk to you guys and pay attention to the chats and forums. I owe the veterans in Mordecai a debt of gratitude for their readiness to help a newcomer. I have dabbled in GD a little, but just enough to turn me off to it. I do truly enjoy HBD, however, and I know I will be around for a long time. One last tidbit concerning WIS, I would be remiss if I didn’t thank David (dwhit34) for introducing me to the game and giving me my start in Mordecai.

I am 33 years old and was born in the suburbs of Philadelphia. I am of Pennsylvania Dutch (which is actually German, from Deutsch) and Swedish descent with a handful of other genetic spices sprinkled in. I am descended from Scranton / Wilkes Barre coalminers on my Dad’s side and God - fearing Lutherans on my Mother’s side. I was diagnosed with Type I Diabetes at the age of 3 and have been dealing with the ups and downs of that as long as I can remember. I grew up a Philadelphia sports fan – 2 of the first 10 words in my vocabulary were ‘F--- Dallas.’ I graduated high school, dropped out of two universities, and at 20 years old God saw it fit to place me in New Orleans, Louisiana (1996.)

I am now living in New Orleans and I work as a cook (in dwhit34’s restaurant!) and also as a barista. It feels as if I’ve found my niche. I am a recovered alcoholic and my sobreity date is 28APR2008, so God willing, I will pick up a two year chip in a couple of months.

To get a superficial idea of my tastes, here are my top fives as of tonight:

Albums

1. The Rolling Stones – Sticky Fingers
2. The Who – Live at Leeds
3. Frank Zappa and the Mothers – One Size Fits All
4. Ween – Pure Guava
5. Thin Lizzy – Vagabonds of the Western World

Books

1. Vladimir Nabokov – Lolita
2. David Foster Wallace – Infinite Jest
3. Kurt Vonnegut – Sirens of Titan
4. Richard Brautigan – In Watermelon Sugar
5. John Kennedy Toole – A Confederacy of Dunces

Films

1. Doctor Strangelove
2. The Big Lebowski
3. On the Waterfront
4. The Outlaw Josey Wales
5. Deconstructing Harry

Well, that’s me in a nutshell. It’s me and I’m in a nutshell… ANYWAY, at least it’s an intro. Like I said, I plan on sticking around for a long time so I look forward to knowing each of you better and revealing more of the intricacies of my character in time.

Know That Owner: Billy Robinson

I'm Billy Robinson aka jimrome76 to most of you WIS guys. Some folks call me Bill, William, or Billy-Bill. And some coworkers have been known to call me Dollar Bill, Brother Bill, Doctor Bill and Bill The Deal. I'm not sure why. I'm one of the original members of Mordecai and have been on WIS since waaaaaay back in 2001. I also played GD for quite awhile and the main reason I picked Mordecai when HBD came out was that I had already played GD with a lot of the owners so I already knew some of them.

I clock in at 31 years old and dont have kids or a wife but for the past couple months I am in a committed relationship for the first time in about 5 years or so. Growing up I lived in Huntsville, AL with my dad and Nashville, TN with my mom. It was a strange contrast of suburbia in Huntsville and inner city ghetto in Nashville but I think in the long run I'm a more well rounded person for having to adapt to such different extremes of society.

When I was 15 I got a part time kitchen job in a restaurant. I enjoyed kitchen jobs and caught on quick so I went full time in kitchens after high school. By the time I was 25 I had 10 years experience including pretty much every position you can think of. Dishwasher, fry cook, saute cook, grill cook, prep cook, banquets cook, banquets service, kitchen manager, night cleaner, dessert cook, pizza cook, these are all positions in a kitchen that I worked under various different chefs at different restaurants. Ive worked for too many guys like this. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qGDNA7GPzI&feature=related I learned from them all but by then I was just burned out on the business. The long 60+ hour weeks and working nights and weekends all for low to mediocre pay had gotten old so it was time to make a change.

In the sumer of 2004 I moved to Auburn, AL and started college at Auburn University that fall. WAR EAGLE! I went to AU for 2 years and completed the core curriculum but could not decide on a major and didnt really like the whole going to classes and studying thing. I forced myself to do it but it was just incredibly boring and tedious so I decided it wasnt for me. Im a lifelong AU fan and I fell in love with this little town so I decided to stay. I got a job at a local Chevy dealership selling cars and eventually parlayed that into a job working on cars which something that Ive loved to do since I was a teenager. So for the last two years Ive worked on cars and made decent money and have a nice easy M-F 7:30-5:30 schedule with an hour lunch break. Ive found the perfect balance.

In my free time I enjoy playing guitar. Ive only been playing for a year and it is ridiculously more hard to learn than I thought it would be. I listen to mostly metal and classic rock but the guitar has opened me up to blues. Guns n Roses is my all time favorite band. Chinese Democracy was on of the top 10 rock albums of the last decade. I like old Metallica, Rage Against the Machine, Sepultura, Slayer, Biohazard etc. When it comes to classic rock I like all of the standard stuff you hear on the radio. CCR, Skynard, Deep Purple, Zepplin, The Beatles, etc. On Thanksgiving weekend I got a noise citation for blasting this song http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_6IjeprfEs at earth shaking levels.

I am obsessed with SEC football. I love my Auburn Tigers. Jordan Hare Stadium is a 10 minute walk from my apartment! We are about to land a top 5 recruiting class and mark my words we will win at least 10 games this year. Gus Malzahns offense is sick but now with a stable of elite talent coming in and a JC QB who fits the offense like a golve we are primed and ready to fire. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6dlRzu_mBc A BCS title is coming soon.

Well there you have it gentlemen. Thats everything but my drivers license number and my DNA sequence. Hope its as interesting to read as it has been for me to live! WAR! DAMN! EAGLE!