Enobytes Wine Blog

You might think from the title that I’ve had too much to drink, but in reality, I’ve had too much to think. I’ve come to realize there are wines worthy of attention that many dismiss if they pray at the alter of the ratings ministry.

Case in point, I was out shopping for a bottle of wine the other day when I overheard a couple of consumers debating about whether or not they should buy a wine that scored 82 points. There were entertaining and convincing arguments from both sides and I simply couldn’t walk away without interjecting my point of view.

Luckily, both welcomed the interruption and listened to my argument, "…if you follow the logic that a wine has to score a 90 or better for it to be good, you are missing out on a lot of damn good wine. Trust me." I departed by passing a business card and announcing, "Now back to your regularly scheduled program."

Not only did they buy the wine, they wrote me about a week later and asked if I could suggest other undervalued wines. I pointed them to our 85+ wines under $10 page.

We’ve all heard so much talk lately about how damaging it is for a wine to receive a
not so perfect score; it’s almost as if the winery should throw in the towel if they receive anything less than a 90+ rating (hence, endeavors like The 89 Project emerge).

In all honesty, wines that score between 80-89 points (or 3-4 stars; good to very good QPR; or a C+ to a B+ (on most rating scales)) are great wines that shouldn’t be overlooked.

So my word of advice is to seek out and embrace all of the great wines our industry has to offer; and the next time you doubt your purchasing decisions solely based on a score, be adventurous and at least give it a try it like Mikey!

…and for all you Winespectator skeptics that think my logic is flawed, check out James Laube’s video for reassurance.

P.S. I have no interest in covering the controversial “ratings” debate and why we have them - I’d like to save this talk for an upcoming post.