Rob;

this all goes to the heart of several conversations that have been going on. Since we're on WS's forum, let's review their scoring system as published.

95-100 Classic
90-94 Outstanding
85-89 Very Good
80-84 Good, a solid well made wine.
75-79 Mediocre, a drinkable wine that may have flaws
50-74 Not recommended.

By your own descriptions, this is not the rating system you are using. you have your own. As it appears so do many other people.

All of that really doesn't matter, except for all those people claiming that some CT scoring system is somehow going to become the new model. Impossible for many reasons, but as a starter because people are using their own numerical systems. An 80-84 is a good well made wine. Some people are using those numbers to rank as plonk. How is Eric going to put that together?

When I am drinking a wine I decide if I think it is outstanding, very good to excellent, or good then I decide to what degree I agree with that description and that is how I give an 87 or 88. Sometimes I feel a wine is between 89 and 90 points and I have to deileberate a bit or sometimes a wine shows me something great then seems to pull back or it is just not as enjoyable so I will give it a range that spans two categories such as 88-91.

Is it parker or WS that describes 85-89 as very good to excellent?

I do slightly bastardize the below


95-100 Classic - totally worthless and used to elavate wine to something that it is not and make the prices outrageous.

90-94 Outstanding I like this category the way it is.

85-89 Very Good to excellent, very good 85 and 86, 87 transcending to excellent and 88-89 I feel very confident saying it is excellent.

80-84 Good, a solid well made wine. I typically like an 84 but the wines I consider 80 - 83 I should possibly be putting in the 70 - 79. I don't know, to me 84 for solid well made seems like we only need on point for that category.

75-79 Mediocre, a drinkable wine that may have flaws Do we need 9 degrees of mediocre to communicate our experience of a wine?

50-74 Not recommended.