The WGOM

Whoa, that's heavy man. I'll be sad to not see ublemann and his gigantic digital avatar beard around.

SBG,I would be more than happy to offer my services for one day a week on a provisional basis. Let me know if you are interested.

Ubes, your game logs were always excellent in detail and your writing will be missed sorely around these parts, I have been lurking for much longer than I have been a citizen and I have always enjoyed what you've had to say. Best of luck.

Oh, wow. I'll miss your writing, ubelmann, but I can only imagine how much work each one took.

That's a bummer, but completely understandable. It was great while it lasted. His perspective, wit and workload will be missed, but there's a lot of other talent in the room. Good luck Ubes -- hopefully we'll see in you in a game log or two.

Ubelmann isn't dead, he's just going to a farm for a while, in the country, with plenty of room to run around and play in the sunshine, and Bat Girl is there too, and they're frolicking together amongst the wild flowers!

But seriously ubes, I suppose after all the knowledge you have dropped on us you have earned a bit of a sabbatical. Fare thee well!

Great, we just became Bat Girl*. Without the Legos. Okay, not really, but if the WGOM was a baseball team, we just lost our number 1 2 starter and our clean-up hitter. The defense takes a hit, too.

I often took Ubelmann's prodigious output for granted. It's easy to do when someone is churning out quality writing on a near-daily basis. You just come to expect it. More than the numbers, which you crunched with aplomb, what I'll miss the most is your writing. By turns, funny, caustic, whimsical, and dry. Always informed and eloquent. Fewer and fewer people have the skill to write coherently. Fewer still do it well. You do it very very well. Be a shame if you stopped using that gift.

Best wishes, sir. Don't be stranger.

*New Guy beats me to the Bat Girl reference.

ubelmann, I just hope that the stuff going on in your life is good stuff. I hope you will at least drop by and comment once in a while. Best wishes to you.

Life gets in the way of life, unfortunately. Your output and insight will be missed, but try not to be a stranger! Or a dread pirate, for that matter.

Almost 100% lurking for the past year, but let me echo the thoughts of everyone else. I'll miss your writing, Ubes. Hope to see you back soon!

Oh, man, no ubelmann? That's like losing access to the Repository. I'm going to be a lot dumber about baseball now.
Good luck, ubelmeister. Before you go, could you explain how this xFIP thing works one more time....?

I hope we didn't ubelbait you away! Thanks for the excellent analysis. Luckily we now know everything there is to know about this team, and it probably won't change much between now and the end of the season.

Let me finish my half-completed BKAC response before I think about writing game log intros ...

We'll miss your input. As someone who's attempted to step into the blogging foray on occasion, I know it's not easy to produce quality content on a daily basis. I appreciate all your efforts.

Some of the darkest days in my years as a baseball fan (not counting 1994-2002 collectively):

- 10 August 1994
- 28 September 1995 (and subsequently, 28 March 1996)
- 18 September - 30 November 1997
- essentially the entire 2001 off-season
- 13 October 2002
- 17 March 2003
- 19 July 2004
- 09 October 2004
- 27 March 2005
- 06 March 2006
- 13 September 2006
- 01 April 2007

I'm looking forward to a time where ubes can devote more time to writing about the Twins again, so I'm not ready yet to add 20 August 2008 to that list. But all things considered, having ubes out indefinitely feels like as bad as Kirby, Mauer, or Liriano for the season.

Does WGOM get any supplemental draft picks for losing a Type A talent? Perhaps there are witty, number-crunching budding writers in high school or college somewhere who can someday rise to Ubel League Posting.

This makes me sad. But ubelmann needs to have his priorities in order. I'm sure that every article he wrote was the product of many hours of analysis.

I have missed his insight lately and WGOM won't be the same without him. Hopefully he will be back when he is able and hopefully he won't be a stranger.

Who's ubelmann again?

j/k. Ubelmann, we'll miss you, but you are certainly welcome here anytime.

Now I'm going to play "guess what happened on the dates Carter Hayes mentioned": (without wiki or google assistance)

- 10 August 1994 - Strike
- 28 September 1995 (and subsequently, 28 March 1996) - Puckett hit in eye (followed by retirement announcement)
- 18 September - 30 November 1997 - no clue
- essentially the entire 2001 off-season - contraction threat (freakin' Bud Selig)
- 13 October 2002 - Angels clinch ALCS
- 17 March 2003 - no clue
- 19 July 2004 - not sure
- 09 October 2004 - Twins eliminated by Yankees in DS
- 27 March 2005 - not sure
- 06 March 2006 - Puckett's death
- 13 September 2006 - Liriano out?
- 01 April 2007 - don't know

Ubes- Thanks for the work you put into this site, you made math fun for me to read and think about again- which is strange because math usually makes my head fuzzy, and for the record I prefer beer to math for a good buzz. As a lot of other people have said, I'll miss your insight and wit around here. Thanks again.

Thanks for your writing so far, Ubes. Good luck on your adventures.

Fare thee well, ubelmann!! Thanks for giving me something to do whilst at work!