Hendry Vineyard Napa Valley Cabernet ½ Bottle 6-Pack
$89.99 (Normally $115.29) 22% off List Price
3 2007 Hendry Vineyard Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 375ml
3 2006 Hendry Vineyard Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 375ml
CT links above

Winery website

This vineyard is just up the road from my house. The wine is very good and this is a good deal. It would be a great deal if they were all 2007. You won't be unhappy with this purchase at this price.

I love that these are half bottles!

Half bottles. HA. Half-price for this wine may be a fairer deal.

I buy a fair bit of wine. I would estimate that I purchased 200 cases of wine in the past 10 years.

I would pass on this wine. It is not a good deal. I expect about 90 WS points or more for a California Cabernet priced at $30/bottle. The 2007 is WS 88.

I am not fazed by a couple of bad scores if the winery has a history of good scores or I have tasted their wines and I know what to expect.

In this case, the winery does not have a solid history based on a quick check with wine spectator.

If you know this is a good wine and you like it then great! Grab some. I consider this purchase too risky given the uncertainty and price/performance.

It would appear that the value of this deal is severely understated since the 375ml bottles of 2007 are selling for $30 each on the winery website. No info on the pricing of the 2006 375ml bottles but would assume the same price....so wine is valued at $180 before shipping costs....Maybe this is part of the new woot math!....but there appears to be much more value in this deal that indicated....CT ratings are respectable as well and this appears to be a good QPR. Am I missing something on the pricing???

techtoysavvy wrote:Half bottles. HA. Half-price for this wine may be a fairer deal.

I buy a fair bit of wine. I would estimate that I purchased 200 cases of wine in the past 10 years.

I would pass on this wine. It is not a good deal. I expect about 90 WS points or more for a California Cabernet priced at $30/bottle. The 2007 is WS 88.

I am not fazed by a couple of bad scores if the winery has a history of good scores or I have tasted their wines and I know what to expect.

In this case, the winery does not have a solid history based on a quick check with wine spectator.

If you know this is a good wine and you like it then great! Grab some. I consider this purchase too risky given the uncertainty and price/performance.

Not sure I can agree with your assessment. CT ratings appear to be fairly consistent over several vintages of this wine:

2004 average CT rating 90.6
2005 average CT rating 91.0
2006 average CT rating 90.8
2007 average CT rating 89.8

About as consistent as you can get, and good ratings as well!

bobrush12866 wrote:CT ratings appear to be fairly consistent over several vintages of this wine:

2004 average CT rating 90.6
2005 average CT rating 91.0
2006 average CT rating 90.8
2007 average CT rating 89.8

About as consistent as you can get, and good ratings as well!

There is a problem with CT. Its CT.

Meaning anyone can put up a score, and its entirely too subjective. Then add in the fact that half the people putting those scores up really don't understand the rating system. In my experience, unless your trained (self or otherwise), its really difficult to tell the difference between 88 and 90 on the scale. I've spent the last 8 years learning about wine, and I am still not great on differentiating all the things that come out in a wine.

I have sat next to a well known winemaker, tasted another producer's wine, and thought it was pretty good. While the winemaker next to me tastes and immediately says 'its flawed'. Not that it wasn't enjoyable, just that it had missed the target, and wasn't a great wine.

So, I guess where I am going with this, is that CT is only good if you are able to find some reviewers who have the same taste preference as you. Find some people who have tasted the same wine as you, an rated it the same. Then follow them, and if they have a high rating...

Sorry for the rant, its just I have tasted too many wines that some Loco in the Coco on CT gave an absurd score to, and skewed the numbers.

wkdpanda wrote: Loco in the Coco on CT

Go Woot filters!

Idjit = Loco in the Coco

That works!

wkdpanda wrote:There is a problem with CT. Its CT.

Meaning anyone can put up a score, and its entirely too subjective. Then add in the fact that half the people putting those scores up really don't understand the rating system. In my experience, unless your trained (self or otherwise), its really difficult to tell the difference between 88 and 90 on the scale. I've spent the last 8 years learning about wine, and I am still not great on differentiating all the things that come out in a wine.

I have sat next to a well known winemaker, tasted another producer's wine, and thought it was pretty good. While the winemaker next to me tastes and immediately says 'its flawed'. Not that it wasn't enjoyable, just that it had missed the target, and wasn't a great wine.

So, I guess where I am going with this, is that CT is only good if you are able to find some reviewers who have the same taste preference as you. Find some people who have tasted the same wine as you, an rated it the same. Then follow them, and if they have a high rating...

Sorry for the rant, its just I have tasted too many wines that some Loco in the Coco on CT gave an absurd score to, and skewed the numbers.

I agree! However, individual ratings within each vintage are fairly consistent with only 1 outlier rating in one of the vintages. Given the lack of any other information to go on, this is better than nothing.

Now if others with some info want to chime in, please do so

wkdpanda wrote:There is a problem with CT. Its CT.

And there's a problem with WS: it's WS.

Certainly you need to take into account the relatively (1) anonymous and democratic nature of cellartracker. But don't treat any mainstream critic as a 100% objective source either. For starters, there will often be very substantial disagreement between WS, WA, IWC (Tanzer), Suckling, Wine Enthusiast, et cetera ad nauseum. If they're all over the map in terms of the description, score, and drinking window, how do you know who's "right"?

There's a host of other reasons not to take the word of WS (et al) as the word of the g-ds: pro reviewers are only useful to the drinker (as opposed to the collector) to the extent they match your palate (WS very rarely does, for me; I do better more often with Tanzer, Burghound, and Galloni of WA); the context of their tasting little sips of a zillion wines at once is so different from our enjoying a bottle over dinner/an evening, that it tends to favor different traits (sheer power/extraction make a wine stand out in a crowd, but don't necessarily help it be a team player with dinner); and even sometimes shaky ethics and pay for play.

Take CT and pro reviews for what they're worth; they each have their place.

(1) people do consistently post under the same handle, so over time you can get a sense of some people's palates

chuck718 wrote:And there's a problem with WS: it's WS.

QFT!!!! I was going to say the same thing!

I have had very nice Zin from these folks before. At ~$30 a bottle for apparently serious Napa cab, I would think this a very decent deal, indeed.
I could have used it when my wife was pregnant and I was drinking for one!

If these are anywhere nearly as well made as the Hendry Zinfandel offerings, you'll be very pleased.

And, if I weren't living in East Berlin circa 1980 (Virginia), I'd be in on this.

mplarkin wrote:If these are anywhere nearly as well made as the Hendry Zinfandel offerings, you'll be very pleased.

And, if I weren't living in East Berlin circa 1980 (Virginia), I'd be in on this.

I actually still have those zins... maybe I should open them some time.

Something does seem to be off with the cost comparison feature on the offer today - if woot would have us believe the listed MSRP, these are being offered at zero discount (excluding tax and shipping), since the offer price is the same as the woot-listed "winery retail price".

Winery Retail Price: $89.99
Average Shipping: $24.00
Average Tax: $6.30
Woot Shipping: (-$5.00)
Total MSRP: $115.29

kylemittskus wrote:I actually still have those zins... maybe I should open them some time.

My Hendry zins are long gone. I prefered the block 28 to the 7 & 22. Wish I has more of that.

wkdpanda wrote:Go Woot filters!

Idjit = Loco in the Coco

That works!

Sort of like an "ID10T" computer error.

And thanks Deckerbrian. I pulled out my 2007 Hendry Block 28 for tomorrow.

chuck718 wrote:And there's a problem with WS: it's WS.

--snippage--

Take CT and pro reviews for what they're worth; they each have their place.

(1) people do consistently post under the same handle, so over time you can get a sense of some people's palates

I agree whole heartedly with most of this. God, I hate what Parker has done to wine. I think both of us have said things that are pretty close to the same, just about different sources.

gotta pass, I could never live with myself drinking 3 bottles of wine a night

fredrinaldi wrote:gotta pass, I could never live with myself drinking 3 bottles of wine a night

Whats wrong with that? All those great anti oxidants are good for you!

If 1.5L bottles can be cellared nearly twice as long as 750ml bottles, does that mean that 375ml bottles shouldn't be held more than half as long as 750s? IOW, is a 5 yr. old Cab in a 375ml bottle the equivalent of a 8-10 yr. old Cab in a 750ml bottle, in terms of aging?

Hmmmm, this is getting complicated!

chipgreen wrote:If 1.5L bottles can be cellared nearly twice as long as 750ml bottles, does that mean that 375ml bottles shouldn't be held more than half as long as 750s? IOW, is a 5 yr. old Cab in a 375ml bottle the equivalent of a 8-10 yr. old Cab in a 750ml bottle, in terms of aging?

I've never heard they cellar 2x as long. Just longer. 375s age more quickly for sure, but again, I'm not sure it's a direct 1/2 correlation.

fred2001 wrote:Something does seem to be off with the cost comparison feature on the offer today - if woot would have us believe the listed MSRP, these are being offered at zero discount (excluding tax and shipping), since the offer price is the same as the woot-listed "winery retail price".

Winery Retail Price: $89.99
Average Shipping: $24.00
Average Tax: $6.30
Woot Shipping: (-$5.00)
Total MSRP: $115.29

That's the first thing I noticed. The deal is in Woot shipping?

I take all ratings with a grain of salt. However, there is an assumed consistency across many reviewers that lets you calibrate to your tastes. I have a general idea about a wine based on a score from WS (same reviewer), RP, WA or WE.

This may be an awesome wine. I don't know. I haven't tasted it. I find it too risky for the price based on reviews from WS. CT reviews are harder to calibrate to my tastes.

If I had tasted the Hendry and it was a great wine then this may be a bargain but still I would expect a discount for not pleasing Wine Speculator.

Other people will value the wine lower once they see the WS score. Without other reviews it impacts the market price.