"Robert Parker has a cold"

[Bill_Klapp_deactivated]

@mike pobega

@Bill Klapp

I rest my case. Where Parker slingeth not the 90+ scores (probably more like 95+ today), he is largely irrelevant, and those are concentrated in only three wine regions on earth. The bottom line reminds me of the old Henry Wadsworth Longfellow poem: to paraphrase, “when [and where] he was good, he was very, very good, and when he was not, he was horrid!” (Not intending that as a Parker bash.) Peace, people. When OP Mike Pobega is the last guy to agree with anything that I have said, I should be happy with the huge win and call it a day! Good thread, Mike…

P.S. I know Sinatra, and Bob Parker is no Sinatra. Spiro T. Agnew, maybe, but no Sinatra…

It has been a good thread. And now we have agreed twice.

And without arrogance, ego or Parker-bashing. I should burn my keyboard and take up golf again!

[Bill_Klapp_deactivated]

By the way, there is some retailer-bashing in order in this discussion, not because they, along with Allen Meadows, always lie or tell half-truths as the Big Blobber tells us (and God knows he is expert in lies and half-truths, if not fine wine), but because, in their endless quest to make a living wage selling wine, they have become the whores of Parker and everybody else who has ever assigned a number to a wine. One cannot possibly give Parker full credit when one looks at the steroidal pimping that he gets from retailers in the U.S. and UK. I do not really mean to denigrate the “any available means” approach to wine sales. I merely observe that Parker would be long gone by now but for the ITB community, who will wean themselves from the heroin of published scores only when there are no scores that are credible to somebody, somewhere left…

[GregT]

Bill I think that is exactly right.

I wonder if Parker´s influence was more on those consumers who tried to make money with wines? I learned over the years that many people on the old Parker board were speculators at least part time. And Parker was the guru. A high Parker score was the guarantee that the wine bought as a future is worth twice the price two or three years later. Today with the sky high prices for the wines Parker loves most this business model came to an end and I guess Parkers influence is no more the same – at least in the en Primeur business.

Interesting Jurgen - most of those people were selling to each other. It’s like musical chairs - someone had to be the last one who ended up paying $500 for a VA-infected wine that he can’t sell now.

[Bill_Klapp_deactivated]

@GregT

Bill I think that is exactly right.

I wonder if Parker´s influence was more on those consumers who tried to make money with wines? I learned over the years that many people on the old Parker board were speculators at least part time. And Parker was the guru. A high Parker score was the guarantee that the wine bought as a future is worth twice the price two or three years later. Today with the sky high prices for the wines Parker loves most this business model came to an end and I guess Parkers influence is no more the same – at least in the en Primeur business.

Interesting Jurgen - most of those people were selling to each other. It’s like musical chairs - someone had to be the last one who ended up paying $500 for a VA-infected wine that he can’t sell now.

I will cop to that…bought a house in Italy by flipping cult Cabs and first-growths!

[Bill_Klapp_deactivated]

I think that we have the title wrong here. Should it not be:

“Bob Parker sneezes and John Lahart, Jeff Leve and Miram Kegl catch colds…”?

[Bill_Boykin]

@Bill Klapp

“Bob Parker sneezes and John Lahart, Jeff Leve and Miram Kegl catch colds…”?

I like it.
I do.

[Bill_Klapp_deactivated]

@Bill Bøykin

@Bill Klapp

“Bob Parker sneezes and John Lahart, Jeff Leve and Miram Kegl catch colds…”?

I like it.
I do.

I hoped that you might. It seems to have been in plain view for some time, but for whatever reason, I did not focus on it…