On the discrete charm of red Bourgs

I believe you are referring to a post by Michael Pronay. In a horizontal of older Bordeaux, where there were backup bottles to compare, he felt that 30% of bottles suffered some form of cork failure- in most cases this probably wasn't TCA, but some ingress of air - we're not talking ruined bottles here, just prematurely aged. think the exact same thing wouldn't happen with California wines. These were all wines bottled with top quality corks. I've had more corked Bdx than any other wine, but that's because I drink more Bdx. Statistically if anything I'd bet my percentage of corked wines (even if you take out the BVs) was maybe higher in CA- in last few years I've had corked Ridges, Dominus, Beringer PR, etc.

Dismissing Burgundy based on bad performances by unknown producers is like dismissing California because of flawed wines from Coturri or insipid Charles Shaw products. In general for me, and MY tastes, I get far better value for my money through careful buying of Burgundy than from California PN. That doesn't mean I don't buy California (though I don't have much PN outside Saintsbury & Littorai- Arcadian is hard to find, Rex Goliath seems to have raised prices and let quality slip, etc), but there I stick to same strategy- producer first (bring on the Edmunds St John, Ridge, Montelena, Havens, Albini - I'll leave the others alone).