WS Top 100

WINE TALK
1

How much do you actually care about the WS Top 100?

I can honestly say that the WS 100 has always been something I have put little if any clout in yet I know tons of people that hurry to retailers with a copy in arm looking to do some serious power shopping.

I think it was Molesworth who said it best that the WS 100 is a Yearbook not a set of new reviews. That being said, does anyone really care about what WS or the WA, IWC, W&S, etc really say?

Just throwing the question out there…

2

When I was first learning about wine, I read WS and yes, I cared.

Now that I feel like I have a bit more education, I don’t give a hoot.

3

I care only slightly more than I care about which Kardashian’s marriage is on the rocks.

4

NOBODY on WB would ever admit that they care…

…But I’m sure many do.

I continue to say this… much like WineBerserkers, I like to see who is on the list just to see if I can discover something I’ve never heard of. Do I run out to Wine Exchange and start perusing the shelves?.. Hell no.

…But if there is a wine I’m not familiar with that is from a region and in a style I generally like AND I run across it, I’ll pick up a bottle. I never EVER would’ve tried Tensley Syrah or Fontodi if it wasn’t for the list. The truth is I’m not even a big fan of Tensley but that’s not the point. It was on the list a few years ago and I ran across it and the price was right. I picked up a few to give it a whirl.

… it also really depends on the reviewer. I know who’s tastes match my own.

5

Wine nerds don’t tend to care about scores, they’ll follow the producers they like and try wines regardless of numbers.

Those that aren’t wine nerds will use scores as a basis for quality (I don’t think there’s a big difference to them between a 91 and a 94), and those that trophy chase will go out and buy the bottles in these lists so they can say they have it.

At the end of the day, scores sell wines. I know of lots of winemakers who have seen a huge uptick in sales after a big score comes out.

6

I don’t care in particular, but like a yearbook it sometimes jogs memories or alerts me to wines that I might be interested in.

I am happy to confess that I use WS as a reference point, and there scores as at least one measure of what might be a promising wine. Doesn’t mean I blindly buy wines with high scores, but I have found that they can help separate wheat from chaff.

7

I’d use it. But I don’t have acces to it and probably can’t afford to 96 point plus wines.

8

It’s a fun thing that is meant to call attention to wine and certain producers, varietals and regions. It would be silly to take it as though it is the gospel on what are the best wines out there, but it’s equally silly to rant and rave about how horrible it is.

Magazines and the internet are full of lists of best restaurants, top movies of the year, best hotels, best cars, and a thousand other things. This is just one wine version of that. I think it is mostly entertainment, but it can have some modest utilty for the more casual and/or newer wine enthusiast, particularly in encouraging people to seek out and try some new producers and regions.

9

I view this list just as I view the WS magazine.

I subscribe to the mag, but mostly as a leisure magazine. I enjoy reading about the history of whatever region they are focused on, I enjoy reading Matt Kramer, and sometimes they do nice articles on certain people who have either made their mark in the wine industry, or are “one’s to watch”. But the ratings are not so important now that I know what I like.

Same for the top 100 list. It is fun, I like trying to predict the winner, I am happy for those winery folks that are applauded for their hard work - but I am not worried about owning anything on the list. If I have it, fine, but I won’t go seek stuff out because it got on the list.

10

I care, and admit to trying to find some of the wines on their top 10 list, or their top 100 list. Molesworth is partially full of shit saying that it’s a yearbook of 2012, and shouldn’t be considered a shopping list. That’s true for him, since he’s tried every wine on that top 100 list, and about 9900 other wines each year. But, for most of us, we’ve not tried anywhere near that number. I’m always curious about wines that I’ve not yet tried, and having a round-table of critics agree that the top ten wines represent some of the most exciting wines they’ve tasted, out of a collective 80,000 or so, gets my attention.

Honestly, I’d love to try ten of what some of the worls most reknowned critics agree are the some of the most exciting wines of the year. What is inherently faulty, plebian, un-geek-like, low-brow, or puny about that? Sure, I know which wines I like. I’ve tried thousands of them. I generally buy select wines and producers that I fancy. I can taste a wine and tell you my thoughts and level of enjoyment without the need for some critic to instruct me on points or notes. We’re all grownups here, people.

But if Jancis Robinson, Hugh Jackson, John Gilman, Jenny Cho Lee, Robert Parker, Allan Meadows, and James Molesworth all called me and said, “hey bud, we all agree, these 10 wines are amazing, caught even our attention, and really blew us away,” I’d certainly take pause and make a mental note to try those wines. If a group of famed book critics came out with a consensus top 10 list of books from 2012 would you be interested in reading a handful? If a group of international restaurant critics, including some of the most famous in the world, said, “these are ten of the most exciting restaurants we ate at all year in your city!” would you consider trying some of the ones you’d not had? I would, and I’m more surprised than anything that so many people scream “MEH.”

This is an age old argument for these boards, though. Are you a slut to critics, or a man of your own ideas? I think you can be both, since you never know when you’ll find your new favorite wine, and suggestions have to come from somewhere. Why not take a flyer on a suggestion from a group of trained and extremely experienced professionals? We take suggestions from other board members, many of whom we’ve not met and know nothing about.

11

My give-a-shitter is broken.

12

I certainly wouldn’t, and herein lies my interest in the list, at least the Top 10 or WOTY. You can’t pause, particularly if it’s a wine you like and usually buy, because there won’t be any left for you. (alarm bells foe me: #5 2009 Guiraud)

Otherwise the list suffers from being simply too arbitrary, which perhaps gets into a deeper problem with wine criticism, but even by WS’ own supposedly objective metric (score) you’ll find plenty of cases where a wine makes the list, and a lower-priced, higher-scored similar wine doesn’t, even from the same producer. Therefore it’s really just a circus, not even a rating of top wines. Or it’s a statement that scores mean nothing, so maybe I’m on board after all [wow.gif]

13

When the 2001 Paloma Merlot got WOTY there were lots that sold on winecommune for $250-$300, of course as more sellers came in the price dropped to about $150-$175. At that time Paloma was selling for $35 or so. [snort.gif]

14

Think it’s a gratuitous waste of paper that has little consumer value, and is more so intended to drive alot of self promotion based on a bunch of top wines that often have been sold out for months.

15

We send this in our e-mail hot list in November of each year…it never gets old!

We would like to start with our heartfelt condolences to all of you assistants, secretaries and go-fers out there whose boss is about to plop down the year end issue of an (overly!) influential wine rag with their Top 100 Wines of the Year and tell you that your continued employment depends on finding him a case each of the top five or ten listed. Do not bother trying to tell him that the list is a compendium of wines highly reviewed throughout the year and nearly all are now either sold out or being flipped at 300% mark-up. He will just do his best rendition of Kevin Spacey as the evil studio exec in Swimming with Sharks and tell you: “you are nothing, you do not think, you exist to make my thoughts into actions, find it or you are fired!“. We’ve been touting lawyer customers for years on this being a rich vein for a class action suit for harrassment….and, no, we do not have any of the wines either. But we DO have new, great stuff arriving daily…

16

I read the list the same way I end up watching VH1 to find out who the greatest guitarist of all time is or NFL network to see who they rated as the best quarterback of the century was. Interesting but I cant say I have ever bought a wine because it was on the list.

17

I respectfully think that you are looking at it the wrong way. They don’t claim that the scores are objective, or that the list is simply based on a formula of points versus price versus availability or anything like that. It is a list of “the most exciting wines,” they explicitly say that the list is subjective, and it is designed to showcase different regions, milestones, new names, a mixture of different price and availability levels, and so forth.


Every year since 1988, Wine Spectator has compiled a list of the most exciting wines we’ve reviewed over the past 12 months. These 100 wines reflect significant trends, recognize outstanding producers and spotlight successful regions and vintages around the world.

In 2012, our list was selected from more than 17,000 new releases our editors rated in our independent blind tastings. More than 5,500 of these wines earned outstanding or classic ratings (90 points or higher on Wine Spectator’s 100-point scale). We narrowed the list down based on four criteria: quality (represented by score); value (reflected by release price); availability (measured by cases made or imported); and what we call the “X-factor”–the excitement generated by a rising-star producer, a benchmark wine or a significant milestone for a wine region. But no equation determines the final selections: These choices reflect our editors’ judgment and passion about the wines we tasted.

In this year’s list, 13 countries are represented. The average score remains consistently strong at 93 points, and the average price per bottle is $46, just $2 more than in 2011. We hope that you enjoy our 2012 list and that it leads you to more deeply explore the world of wine.

18

I hate it: Causes under the radar wines to disappear “just because”.