Sequel was the last one that I used and was the best one. I can't remember the talk..."ORM's are the Vietnam of programming".

You are right, very little of the ORM gets used in the end and one almost always needs to write custom SQL anyway (models don't always map 100% to app layer). Most importanly, as languages change, evolve or dry up it's easier to find or train new talent with SQL experience vs. a language specific ORM.