Vintage bias ... is it real?

[Glenn E.]

Bah, double post. I'm getting an error when I hit submit, but evidently the post is going through anyway.

[Andy Velebil]

Ok but an 85 point Port from say the 2000 vintage would be a poor score would it not. I'm sure no one here would dispute that in the scheme of things. But an 85 point rating from a 200 year old Port would be acceptable would it not? I'm pretty sure most people here would agree that if a VP that was 200 years old got 85 points that was a pretty darn good score.

What I'm getting at is that no matter how you look at it, there can be some fault found in any method. But like I've said, I think its best to compare wine to its peers for a true evaluation. You can have two wines that have the same score yet have totally different reasons for having that score. So if a 90 point Chardonnay had the same TN comments as a 90 point Port there is something seriously wrong. Both can be 90 points, but for very different reasons. That is why ANY point system has inherent flaws...people tend to ONLY look at scores.

But you contradict yourself...Whats the difference between giving an old wine a decent review and indicating why in your notes verses a closed phase bottle where you have to read the notes to find out it was closed and how it will be in the future.

So its ok to give a good rating for a closed wine at the time of tasting but not an old wine. There is no difference, a score is being based soley on the label at that point for both.

[Glenn E.]

Ok but an 85 point Port from say the 2000 vintage would be a poor score would it not. I'm sure no one here would dispute that in the scheme of things. But an 85 point rating from a 200 year old Port would be acceptable would it not? I'm pretty sure most people here would agree that if a VP that was 200 years old got 85 points that was a pretty darn good score.

Of course, but if they're both given an 85 then I expect them to be about as good as one another, relatively speaking. It can be impressive for one Port to get an 85 and disappointing for a different one, yet still have the 85 rating be consistent.

But you contradict yourself...Whats the difference between giving an old wine a decent review and indicating why in your notes verses a closed phase bottle where you have to read the notes to find out it was closed and how it will be in the future.

So its ok to give a good rating for a closed wine at the time of tasting but not an old wine. There is no difference, a score is being based soley on the label at that point for both.

No, of course not. The closed wine should get the same poor rating as the old wine. If I said that I didn't mean to. But I may be confusing the terminology.

I'm using "rating" or "score" to mean the number score, and only the number score. I've been trying to use "review" or "notes" to mean whatever other verbiage is attached that explain the rating. And really, no tasting note is complete without the review for any number of reasons, many of which have been mentioned in this thread.

For me, the rating should be absolute and uniform. An 85 means the same thing whether the Port is 200 years old or 2 years old, closed or open, too youthful and brash or simply old and fading. The reasons behind the 85 could be vastly different, but the theory is that an 85-point rating should give 85 points worth of relative enjoyment regardless of the reasons noted in the review.

The review is where you explain why the Port might be worth drinking/purchasing even though it's only 85 points. One could say "fer cryin' out loud it's 200 years old, what do you expect?!? This Port is amazing when you think about how old it is!" And if you honestly believe that it's going to get better with more age... then estimate how much better and much longer it's going to take. But I was sort of assuming that at 200 years old, it's not likely to get any better with more time. In the case of a closed wine, though, it probably will open up and get better with some age, so if you think you can do so you should note that in the review (but not in the rating).

This is all part of the reason that I don't provide ratings when I do tasting notes. I don't feel like I have experienced enough Port yet to be able to assign a number on any scale. What does 100 points taste like? I'm not sure I know yet, and if I don't know what 100 points means then how can I give something a 99? And if I can't give out a 99, how can I give out a 98? Etc.

I finally have a number of 100 point Ports (as rated by others), though, and eventually I'll try them. I may not agree with their ratings, but at least at that point I'll know what others consider to be Port perfection. And at that point I'll be able to meld the ratings that others have given out with what I like and create my own personal scale.

[Andy Velebil]

Glenn,
I guess we are just going to have to agree to disagree on that one thats why I love this board

[Roy Hersh]

It is nice seeing someone else but me typing that line Andy! :help:

Actually, it truly is what makes this a great place to discuss Port. We can disagree with one another and maintain respect and friendships too, as ultimately this is just serious banter about a wine we're all crazy about.

[Glenn E.]

Hehe... speaking of which, I think I may now have a lower bound for my internal scale. :twisted:

The 1873 Schofield VP that I had at the Old & Odd tasting in NYC last weekend could, at best, be described politely as well below average.

Other words that were used to describe it at the event were undrinkable, foul, horrible, awful, and spoiled. And it got worse as the night wore on! But since we were able to pour it out of the bottle and into a glass, it gets 50 points on the Parker scale!

[Andy Velebil]

Glenn

Would that be 50+ points LOL

[Glenn E.]

I have occasionally wondered if that 50-point floor might have been deliberate, as if to say "yes, it is possible to make a wine worse than 50 points, but no one would bother bottling it because it wouldn't be drinkable." It would be, in a way, tacit acknowledgement that wines have to be of some minimum quality level to be bottled at all.

But back to the Port...

I think that if I were going to rate the 1873 Schofield that I would still have to give it more than 50 points. It was quite bad, and I would never buy a bottle of it, but I could imagine it being worse and yet still drinkable. So if my above hypothesis about the 100-point scale is correct, the Schofield in its current state could still degrade over time without dropping below that theoretical 50-point "minimum for bottling" threshold. I might give it 55-60 at the start of the night because - as I noted in my TN - it wasn't that horrible on the first pass. It was only after time (and head-to-head comparisons) that it really showed as beyond hope to me.

It got pretty close to 50 points as the night wore on, though. By the time I finished the glass I was doing it just out of respect for such an old Port, not because I was at all interested in finishing it.

[Andy Velebil]

It got pretty close to 50 points as the night wore on, though. By the time I finished the glass I was doing it just out of respect for such an old Port, not because I was at all interested in finishing it.

Yeah, even though those old Ports aren't the best, its still fun to drink something that was made the year Napoloen III died and when "Russia established a fixed boundary between Afghanistan and it's new territories, Russia promised to respect Afghanistan's territorial integrity." I guess some things change with time

[Glenn E.]

Some day I want to try something that pre-dates the Phylloxera plague... I think that would be cool. 1873 was probably close. I don't know exactly when the plague hit the various parts of Europe, just that it was in the mid-late 1800's.

[Morten O]

I have occasionally wondered if that 50-point floor might have been deliberate, as if to say "yes, it is possible to make a wine worse than 50 points, but no one would bother bottling it because it wouldn't be drinkable." It would be, in a way, tacit acknowledgement that wines have to be of some minimum quality level to be bottled at all.

Or: As long as the beverage contains alcohol, it's worth the first 50 points in my book


Regarding Andy and Glenn's disagreement over scoring systems, I think both are right. That's a problem itself as you never know which system is in use. It appears to me as if Glenn is using rational scoring while Andy is using 'emotional' scoring. If everyone in the world uses Glenn's system then the wine producing and selling part of the wine world would be very, very afraid. It would create transparency and who in that business would want that?! . This is where QPR enters. Two wines that are far from being on same level of quality can be scored with same rating if it's clearly shown which price category they belong to.

Personally I would like to see Glenn's system being used everywhere to create transparency, but I guess that's utopian.

[Todd Pettinger]

Great topic so far...

There are some good comments here, and I won't bore everyone to tears with quoting what has been said several times, but after careful consideration, my own opinion is that a truly blind tasting is not what I want to see. I would like to see a rating, with the pro taster knowing only that what they are drinking is Port (I didn't say VP, but that assumption would be made with pro tasters - Andy's experiment with the LBV in the VP tasting is exactly what I am thinking about here) and the year.

I have to agree with Andy and Moses here that the year and appelation/type of wine being rated should and almost has to be presented to the taster. However, the house and if applicable, sub-classification (ex. Noval's 2nd label Silval or premiere Nacional), should be blind - always - when professional wine tasters are doing ratings.

I am guessing that Taylor and Fonseca, as good as those classic VPs are, have benefited greatly from non-blind tastings over the years.

The reason I believe a year and type of wine should be known is for the exact reasons that Andy has mentioned - you really cannot expect accurate ratings if you don't know what to expect somewhat. Although the year may slightly influence the rating, it should be a fair influence - if you know you are having a 2003 VP or 2009, you will KNOW it is more than likely going to be in a mute, closed phase. I am not sure it is fair to give a rating of sub-90 for a great Fonseca 2003 if you know that it likely will 2-3 decades before it even begins to approach a proper drinking window.

Honestly, the only 'pro' taster whose scores I pay any attention to is Roy Hersh. No, not sucking up to "da boss" here, simply observing that he seems able to dole out the criticism when it is relevant and fair, and does not let label influence his decisions often.

I witnessed that in a recent tasting he led where he assigned the legendary 1994 "100-point" Taylor VP a score that was 5-7 pts lower than his normal ranking, which has never been 100. Why? That particular bottle did not show well (much to MY dismay!:)) and he was being fair.

Just this guy's
Todd

[David Spriggs]

I am guessing that Taylor and Fonseca, as good as those classic VPs are, have benefited greatly from non-blind tastings over the years.

And also causes so called lesser houses to be completely overlooked. That's a very narrow view. For example, today on the Parker board a poll was put up to select the best producer of 20-40 year Tawny Port. The selections were: Taylor, Dow, and Warre. None of those are my top pick. That's like saying pick the best Bordeax and you have a choice of Lynch-Bages, Pichon-Barron, and Figeac. Good wines, but not the best IMO. Anyway, Constantly reviewing Taylor with a high score is what I see... and what people follow. More blind tastings with more producers would produce more interesting results... and let the cream rise to the top.

I know people on other boards disagree, but I still respect wine spectators protocol the most. I highlighted the parts I think are critical:

• All official Wine Spectator tastings are held in private rooms, under optimum conditions.
  
  Our tasting coordinators organize the wines into flights by varietal, appellation or region.
  Each flight may consist of 20 to 30 wines, and no more than two flights are tasted by a taster each day.
  
  Bottles are coded and bagged, and all capsules and corks are removed. Other necessary efforts are made to conceal the wines' identity from the tasters.
  
  The tasters are told only the general type of wine (varietal and/or region) and the vintage. No information about the winery or the price of the wine is available to the tasters while they are tasting.
  
  Each tasting begins with a previously rated wine, which is tasted non-blind as a reference point.
  
  Other previously rated wines are included in the blind wines to ensure consistency.
  
  The tasters enter notes and ratings directly into our database prior to removal of the bags.
  
  The tasters only see the code that matches that of the bag covering the wine they are tasting, and blank spaces for their note, score and drink recommendation.
  
  Ratings are based on potential quality: how good the wines will be when they are at their peak. For ageable wines, we suggest a year or range of years to start drinking the wine.
  
  Additional comments may be added to a tasting note after the identity of the wine has been revealed, but the score is never changed.
  
  Price is not taken into account in scoring, although the notes are often edited after the scores are determined to include comments about price and value.

Seems like a fair and repeatable protocol. You can quibble with their scores, and the Parker crowd certainly doesn't like it when they don't anoint the board or Parker favorite, but I think that the protocol is a good one.

-Dave-

[Glenn E.]

My regard for Wine Spectator just went up! Thanks for posting that, Dave.

That seems like a good rating protocol to me. I can understand the need for the taster to know vintage, varietal, appellation, or region even though I don't think it is necessary in a purely theoretical sense. But since Wine Spectator is rating based on potential quality and not current quality, that information is important. (My arguments have been based on rating current quality.) You can't rate potential quality if you don't know the vintage, and even varietal/appellation/region will affect the way a wine will normally age.

[Todd Pettinger]

I agree Dave, this sounds most fair.

There is something to be said for consistency of a particular house, so maybe if a particular bottle does not show well (to account for bottle variation, as alluded to in my above post about Roy's lower-than-typical score of the Taylor 94) that s fair to have commentary made on it, but the score for that tasting/bottle should not be altered. A subsequent tasting where a better bottle scores better can be held and that adjusted score can be the one "published" - which I will likely ignore anyway, but it is the most fair!