What To Expect With 2014 Oregon Pinot Noirs?

I know that we have a lot of Oregon residents who participate here. I would appreciate opinions as to what to expect with the 2014 Pinots. Thanks.

Not a resident but it’s a ripe vintage, lots of material, but not Cali ripe. I’ve bought very selectively. The Patty Green Berserker cuvée and and the lower level Cameron wines are quite ripe but all have been enjoyable.

I recently went through one of our wineries 14’s and 12’s, both ‘ripe’ vintages.

I was really surprised as the 12’ seemed heavy and thick with low acid, the 14’s on the other hand were bright, high acid with riper fruit, but I wouldn’t say too ripe.

Also depends on where your talking about, ribbon ridge, Eola, yamhill-Carlton and producer.

Many people made very ripe and weighty wines while others made bright and elegant wines.

There is a thread somewhere on these Berserker pages about vintage vs. producer. For the Willamette Valley it is overwhelmingly producer first, vintage second. Granted, no one is going to make a wine that is both taut and mineral/herb driven in a hot year, and tasty too; although you can get a concentrated, high alc. wine in a lean year with "technique’. The best wine makers will reflect the growing conditions honestly within the limits they are willing to work with.
From what I’ve tasted in barrel samples and lower level initial releases I have no fears of 2014.
I am concerned with '15.

P Hickner

14, 15 and 16 are a perfect trifecta of throwing Richard Trimpi in the ditch.

2014 was Oregon’s warmest vintage on record at the time. 2015 did surpass it slightly.
Balancing out the heat, 2014 was an enormous set. Big clusters and big berries, but with plenty of heat to ripen the fruit. If there was ever a vintage to let everything hang, this was it. Larger berry vintages, IMO, often lead to more elegant less structured wines with pure fruit flavors(particularly in destemmed ferments). I think many of the board favorites produced lovely wines in 2014, probably earlier drinking than typical, but not lacking in cellar ability.
Entry level wines from good producers are great choices. 1) there’s a lot of wine, so really good barrels are getting de-classified into entry level 2) quality was extremely even so there’s little atrocious wines, other than folks letting the abv get out of hand.
I also think cooler sites will produce great wines. Abbey Ridge. Whistling Ridge, Sojourner(check out the Walter Scott bottling from this vineyard), Temperance Hill should be stand outs.

Jason-just a note on 2012s. Most I have tasted recently are in a dumb phase. They seem flat, ponderous, and sometimes simple. At 4 years, I generally don’t open any Burgs, and more and more do the same with Oregon.

2015 is the best burly vintage I have ever worked with. Skin thickness and integrity was amazing. I had things that went a week without giving me enough juice to get a sample. The wines are intense, but very balanced. ABV is moderately high but not bad. Tasting through the cellar gives me pause as I think about the wines putting on weight, but they are layered, intense, structured, and yet quite pure with excellent delineation between sites(something a little lacking in 2014s).

My experience with the 14’s so far is that they are ripe but not as heavy compared to 2012 but also not as bright as say the 09’s. They have good acidity and the riper fruit will seem like a nice step up from the 13’s. Have had just one '15 so far and I echo Marcus in that it seems much more structured than the '14 version. BTW, the wine was Underwood, always an early release and a solid value play, IMO.

and it comes in a can

Every cloud…as they say. More cash for bicycle stuff.

Come on La Niña.

RT

Marcus, I get it but unfortunately to sell wine, people want to try it so baby killing was the order of the day.

I guess my comment is more introspective as I’ve sort of lumped, 12’, 14’ and 15’ as ripe vintages, to me it was a stark difference in the acidity level. I agree that Oregon Pinot as well as Burgs don’t shine for a while and have a tendency to go through dumb fazes (that’s why I cellar both).

Marcus summed it up nicely for you.

On a vintage like 2014, I do a lot of buying at the blend and declassified level. I bought several cases of sub $20 pinot from my favorites and the wine is amazing for the price, truly great value in the wine. As I taste through more and more '14s I’m surprised at the diversity (depending on winemaker and vineyard site). I, at first wasn’t really that excited about '14s for SVD bottlings but they are more interesting to me than expected. A lot more red fruited than I expected also.

Pick a few good producers you like and try their wine every year and I don’t think you’ll be disappointed.

Don’t get me wrong, I love an awful vintage. I’d rather they all sucked so I could get my game on. In the meantime, I’ll make something very pretty.

If I had to use a word to represent our wines for the '14, '15, and '16 vintages, it would be forward, structure, and bright (super preliminary), respectively. For us, the vintages and resulting wines couldn’t be more different.

Obviously, this will vary for each producer, especially with respect to the different vineyards we work with, but I think to say that all three vintages are simply “warm” would be a great disservice to some really, really fantastic wines! I hope people will seek out wines from each vintage enthusiastically. I have a feeling most will be more than pleasantly surprised.

“One man’s awful”…and all. Sadly, the least appreciated results seem to come from vintages that require “getting your game on”. More of the competition will stumble but the better results…Yeah Baby!

RT