Doug Bryant, President, Sherlock’s Wine Merchant
Maître, Commanderie de Bordeaux à Atlanta
Like the swallows to Capistrano, every year I and my Sherlock team return to
Bordeaux in early April for the en primeur tastings. Slurp, swirl, spit 75 times a day,
in search of the Holy Gruaud. And, as you have heard, there are many spectacular
2010 wines. Bill Blatch’s weather report predicted great taste, but there is nothing
like the actual barrel samples to confirm that, indeed, the sunlight was successfully
converted into nectar.
These 2010’s are big, delicious, long‐lasting wines, like 1989. The numbers betray
their power: anthocyanins at the highest level ever; alcohol reaching 15% in some
cases; great acidity and stunning fruit. The only mistake that a few made was to
over‐extract the tannins during the fermentation process. The tannins were so ripe
in these grapes that it took extra care to refrain from pumping over too frequently
or leaving the wine on the skins too long. One in 10 of the wines I tasted seemed
over‐extracted for my palate.
There is always a lot of buzz about “the wine of the vintage.” This year, the
contenders in my opinion are Châteaux Margaux, Latour, Haut Brion, Lafite‐
Rothschild, Leoville‐Las‐Cases, Mouton and surprisingly, Vieux Château Certan. But
it’s a question of taste; every mouth has a different chemistry. However, in April the
“buzz” kept returning to Ch. Margaux as the leader of the pack, confirmed not only
by my tasting notes but also by Vincent Cheung, Grand Maître of the Commanderie
in Asia. Pinpoint balance with round, small tannins. Elegant power and finesse.
Interestingly, Paul Pontallier held back the alcohol level to 13.5% in the Grand Vin
and put more of the ripe Merlot into the Pavillon Rouge.
After our return to Atlanta, Liv‐Ex published their “Wisdom of the Crowd” survey.
They poll 370 of the world’s leading wine buyers and ask them to rank the wines
they tasted en primeur. That survey produced the following ranking, confirming at
least that my taste was somewhat similar to the wine‐buying world:
LIV‐EX SURVEY ‐ 370
1. Margaux
2. Lafite Rothschild
3. Latour
4. Vieux Chateau Certan
5. Petrus
6. Haut Brion
7. Pontet‐Canet
8. Ausone
9. Mouton Rothschild
10. Cheval Blanc
Then we all waited for God – the Robert Parker ratings. In early May they appeared, and
my Sherlock’s team looked anxiously to see how he lined up against the rest of the world
and against our own tasting.
Here is Robert Parker’s Top 10: Here is the Liv-Ex Top 10 Survey
List with overlaps from Parker in
Italics:
Parker View: Liv-Ex Survey -370:
1 Latour* 1 Margaux
2 Petrus* 2 Lafite Rothschild
3 Lafite Rothschild* 3 Latour
4 Haut Brion* 4 Vieux Chateau Certan
5 Ausone* 5 Petrus
6 La Mission Haut Brion* 6 Haut Brion
7 Mouton Rothschild 7 Pontet Canet
8 Pichon Baron*** 8 Ausone
9 Pontet Canet*** 9 Mouton Rothschild
10 Montrose 10 Cheval Blanc
Tied for 1st Place*
Tied for 8th Place***
In general, Parker’s view overlaps with the Liv‐Ex survey. Seven out of 10 are on both
lists. However, it struck me as very odd that Margaux and Vieux Château Certan
were not in the top 10 on Parker’s list, given that they were both in the top four
wines of the vintage based upon the Liv‐Ex “Wisdom of the Crowd” survey, and
also my own tasting experience supports this view.
This puzzle as to why Parker had left Château Margaux out of his top 10 was perhaps
best captured by Simon Staples of Berry Brothers & Rudd, who commented in his blog,
“Robert Parker has finally seen the light and agrees with us on … the 2010′s… apart
from (his judgment of) Ch. Margaux, where he clearly left his tastebuds at the
previous chateau!” (Admittedly, Cheval Blanc, Ducru Beaucaillou, L’Evangile, Le Pin,
Margaux, Troplong Mondot and Vieux Chateau Certan are all tied for 11th place in
Parker’s top 20.)
Wanting to explore this situation a bit more, I worked with another Commandeur in
Boston, Angelo Manioudakis, to analyze the top 10 Bordeaux 2010 wine ratings of other
respected professionals. This we did utilizing another Liv‐Ex metric, their Total Score
list that normalizes the various scoring systems critics use.
It was instructive to note that after averaging the scores of nine respected wine critics,
there was 90% agreement with the Liv‐Ex Top Ten Wisdom of the Crowd survey. It is
also exciting to see the breadth of 2010 Bordeaux wines rated 95 and above – speaking
to the overall exciting quality of the 2010 vintage! And Margaux indeed emerges at the
top of this list despite Parker’s lower score, showing how strongly the other critics felt
about Margaux.
Then we began to wonder, “How closely do Parker’s scores correlate with the scores from
the other eight top wine critics?” By dusting off some high school algebra, we were able
to see that Parker’s ratings correlate generally but not exactly with an average of the
other eight critics’ ratings. In regression analysis speak, his R2 value is only .56.
But where does Robert Parker differ most widely from his wine critic colleagues? This
can be important for the Commanderie, since in general, Parker ratings often drive
pricing. If we can identify wines that are rated relatively lower by Parker, but are more
appreciated by the other critics, that may identify an interesting buying opportunity.
This led us to construct the following graph:
Based upon this analytical approach, one could argue that the degree to which Parker
may have under‐estimated the quality of a wine is indicated by the perpendicular
distance of a château above the regression line. In other words, wherever the world’s
leading critics thought much more highly of the wine than Robert Parker, the data point
will appear well above the regression line. Based upon this perspective, I recommend
that the Commanderie look carefully at purchasing the 2010 vintages of Margaux, Vieux
Château Certan, and Leoville‐Barton before the world figures out that Parker indeed
lost his tastebuds on the road to Château Margaux this Spring.
Data Sources: Liv‐Ex.com, eRobertParker.com, bbrblog.com
Data Analysis: Angelo Manioudakis, Commandeur, CdB Boston