Point scores for wines

The article published in the May 2012 edition of Wine Business Monthly on the subject of point scores for wines comes at the very time that the Australian show system is in the process of moving to, or actively thinking about, a 100-point scoring structure.  It gives rise to a number of observations:

A number of notable winewriters (most notable of all Hugh Johnson of the UK) refuse to allot points as a matter of principle, arguing an intelligent reader will be able to read between the lines, as it were, and have the same opportunity to assess the style/quality without recourse to the ‘dumbing down’ impact of points.

The problem is that, whether it be 100 points, 20 points, 5 stars or whatever, it is the first piece of information readers eyes are attracted to, the words thereafter read in the context of the points.  As a somewhat futile exercise in trying to change that process, I do place the points in the Wine Companion after the tasting note.

It seems to me that what is important about scores is that the writer is consistent in his or her application of points, and that there is a meaningful spread of the top and bottom ranges.

Thus, for better or worse, the 20-point scale is effectively a 9-point scale, ranging between 10 and 19.

The 100-point scale is effectively a 20-point scale, ranging between 80 and a highly-improbable 100.  It seems to me to be unimportant whether reviewers are ‘hard’ or ‘soft’ in alloting their points as long as they maintain a spread and are consistent.  Thus Tim White is joined by Andrew Jefford of the UK in being a ‘hard’ taskmaster, deliberately restricting, it would seem, the top scale to 90 or less.  What they miss is the reverse side of the coin: 80 points from either Jefford or White will be seen as a generous mark denoting a good wine.  The same score from myself or other writers happily awarding points well into the 90s is the mark of a very ordinary, although not outright faulty, wine.

Again on a purely personal basis, 97 points is normally my highest score for a table wine, with less than 5 out of 9000 wines tasted in any 12-month period receiving 98 points.  No table wine receives 99 or 100, the exceptions being Seppeltsfield’s 100 Year Old Para (supreme unto itself, and falling outside all of the normal indicia) and, with a rush of blood to my head on one occasion to ‘98 Krug.