FLOAT 100 · Wine · No. 39
Scarecrow Cabernet Sauvignon 2018
Named for a character in The Wizard of Oz and grown partly on Cabernet vines that an MGM executive planted in 1945 at his neighbor's urging, the 2018 Scarecrow came from Napa's coolest, latest season in years and drew a perfect score from Jeb Dunnuck.
- Maker
- Scarecrow
- By price in wine
- 53 of 100
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Create a free account- Producer
- Scarecrow, J.J. Cohn Estate, Rutherford, Napa Valley
- Founders
- Bret Lopez, grandson of MGM executive J.J. Cohn, and Mimi DeBlasio
- Winemaker
- Celia Welch, Director of Winemaking since the first vintage, 2003
- Grape
- 100% Cabernet Sauvignon, per the Wine Advocate review
- Harvest
- By hand, at night, from September 24 into mid-October 2018
- Aging
- About 22 months in French oak, roughly 80% new; bottled in late July 2020 without fining or filtration
- Production
- 1,800 cases
- Old vines
- The 'Old Men,' Cabernet planted in 1945 on St. George rootstock
- Critics
- Jeb Dunnuck 100, Wine Advocate 98, Vinous 97
Inglenook's neighbor
The J.J. Cohn Estate in Rutherford borders what was once the vineyard of Gustave Niebaum, founder of Inglenook, whose plantings covered more than 1,000 acres of Napa Valley at the end of the 19th century. Niebaum's nephew John Daniel Jr. took over Inglenook in 1939, determined to restore it to its pre-Prohibition standing with Bordeaux-style wines.
His neighbor was Joseph Judson Cohn, a Hollywood executive who had bought a 180-acre parcel a few years earlier as a summer retreat for his family. In 1945 Daniel persuaded Cohn to plant 80 acres of Cabernet Sauvignon, replacing a prune orchard, with a promise that Inglenook would buy the grapes. Cohn had no ambition to make wine himself.
Cohn's fruit figured prominently in Inglenook's celebrated postwar Cabernets. Over the following decades the grapes went to some of Napa's best-known wines, among them the Beaulieu Vineyard Georges de Latour Private Reserve, the Robert Mondavi Reserve, Opus One from 1979 through 2022, Niebaum-Coppola, Duckhorn, Joseph Phelps Insignia and Etude.
What made the vineyard rare was a decision not taken. From the mid-1960s, Napa growers replanted on a hybrid rootstock called AxR#1, which later proved highly vulnerable to phylloxera. Cohn kept his vines on the older St. George rootstock. By the time AxR#1 failed, the estate says, virtually all of Napa's old St. George vines were gone, and only the original 1945 J.J. Cohn vines survived. Bret Lopez nicknamed these moss-covered vines the 'Old Men.'
The studio chief, the photographer and the winemaker
J.J. Cohn was born in Harlem in 1895 to Russian immigrants and grew up in severe poverty. He moved west in the 1920s, started as a bookkeeper and rose to become Chief of Production at MGM, where his unofficial motto, 'Nothing is impossible,' became his staff's. The estate credits him as instrumental in Ben Hur, Gigi, Mutiny on the Bounty and The Wizard of Oz. He lived to be 100.
His grandson Bret Lopez was born in Los Angeles in 1948 and sold his first photograph, to a Los Angeles Times Sunday supplement, within a month of picking up a camera. At 16 he was shooting jazz musicians for Contemporary Records; by 25 he was shooting major ad campaigns. In 1986 he met Mimi DeBlasio, and they worked together until 1998, when he quit commercial photography. Lopez spent childhood vacations at his grandfather's Rutherford summer house.
In 2002 Lopez and DeBlasio took over the property. One detailed account says the family sold the land in a package deal for $33.6 million, with Francis Ford Coppola taking 140 acres and Lopez and DeBlasio 25 acres, including the block of the oldest vines, and that it was reported at the time as the highest price per acre ever paid for agricultural land. The grape contracts were canceled and the fruit kept for their own wine.
For a winemaker, Lopez called a list of ten names. The last was Celia Welch, a 1982 UC Davis fermentation science graduate who had consulted full time since 1995. According to that account, she told him she had no room for another client until she heard the name of the vineyard, then said: 'You own the J.J. Cohn estate... you're the man with the magic grapes: for you, I will drop a client.' She has made every vintage since.
2018: Napa's late, cool year
After the blazing heat of 2017, the estate writes, 2018 was one of the coolest growing seasons in recent memory. Rainfall was 45% below 2017, but most of it fell in March and filled the soil just as the vines began to grow. Flowering in mid-May came in ideal weather, setting a very large crop.
Lisa Perrotti-Brown described the Napa summer as 'cool to warm rather than hot,' with foggy mornings, hazy afternoons and chilly nights. Most Cabernet did not go through veraison until well into August, and in the first week of November a lot of Cabernet was still unharvested. Napa Valley Vintners reported crops 20% to 30% above average, with cluster weights up about 20%. She found smoke taint from the Mendocino Complex Fire in some wines, but called it localized, mostly to Atlas Peak and parts of Howell Mountain.
Scarecrow picked entirely by hand, at night, starting with the Old Men on September 24. The estate's own page gives two end dates, October 15 in its vintage notes and October 19 in the winemaker's notes. The grapes were destemmed, optically sorted and fermented in small batches, spent about 24 days on skins, and went into French oak, roughly 80% new. The blend was finalized in January 2020, and after about 22 months in barrel the wine was bottled in late July 2020 without fining or filtration. The estate made 1,800 cases.
What the critics found
Celia Welch summed up the season in one word: moderation. Weeks of mild stress alternated with weeks of recovery, and she wrote that this 'slow, methodical ripening is immediately apparent' in the wine, with aromas of 'blackberries on the vine, dusty cherries, and a sense of fresh earth' and tannins that 'show polish and power in the same moment.'
Jeb Dunnuck, tasting it on January 27, 2021, gave it 100 points: 'Pure perfection in Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon,' predicting it would evolve for 30 years or more. Lisa Perrotti-Brown, in The Wine Advocate of November 5, 2020, scored it 98 and called it 'Simply gorgeous!', with a drinking window of 2023 to 2053. Antonio Galloni of Vinous gave it 97 in December 2020, writing that it 'shows why this Rutherford site is so highly regarded.'
Across its history Scarecrow has earned six perfect 100-point scores from The Wine Advocate, the estate says. The very first vintage, 2003, drew 98 points from Robert Parker, which one account calls the highest score ever given to an inaugural release; the winery had 260 customers on its list the next morning.
A mailing-list wine
Scarecrow is sold first to a mailing list, by invitation each spring after a waiting period of roughly three years. Production is small: a large vintage is about 2,000 cases, according to one profile. On a collectors' forum, one longtime buyer recalled the 2018's mailing-list price as $450 a bottle, and another remembered it selling out between the second and third release waves because it was a great vintage.
The estate's wine has set charity auction records. At Napa Valley's annual trade barrel auction in 2009, a 60-bottle lot of Scarecrow brought $80,000, then a record that doubled the previous high. At the same auction in 2014, the top lot was five cases of 2012 Scarecrow at $260,000.
In 2026, U.S. retailers listed the 2018 at $895 and $999.95 a bottle.
The numbers
- Estate vineyard
- 25 acres planted, about 2 acres of them the remaining 1945 Cabernet Sauvignon
- Farming
- All vines dry farmed
- 2018 production
- 1,800 cases
- Typical large vintage
- About 2,000 cases
- Jeb Dunnuck (January 2021)
- 100
- The Wine Advocate (Lisa Perrotti-Brown, November 2020)
- 98
- Vinous (Antonio Galloni, December 2020)
- 97
Timeline
Joseph Judson Cohn is born in Harlem.
John Daniel Jr. takes over Inglenook next door.
At Daniel's urging, Cohn plants 80 acres of Cabernet Sauvignon on St. George rootstock.
Bret Lopez, Cohn's grandson, is born in Los Angeles.
Lopez meets Mimi DeBlasio.
Lopez buys the Rutherford property from his family and moves there with DeBlasio.
First vintage of Scarecrow, made by Celia Welch; Robert Parker later scores it 98.
Scarecrow releases its first vintage.
Juice left out of the Scarecrow blend becomes the first M. Etain.
A 60-bottle Scarecrow lot brings $80,000 at Napa Valley's annual trade barrel auction, a record at the time.
Flowering in ideal weather sets a very large crop.
Harvest of the 2018 begins with the 1945 'Old Men' vines.
The final 2018 blend is assembled.
The 2018 is bottled unfined and unfiltered after about 22 months in oak.
The Wine Advocate scores the 2018 98 points.
Antonio Galloni of Vinous scores the 2018 97.
Jeb Dunnuck tastes the 2018 and scores it 100.
The world in 2018
Thousands of U.S. high school students join the National School Walkout against gun violence.
Kim Jong Un crosses into South Korea to meet Moon Jae-in, the first North Korean leader to cross the DMZ since 1953.
Prince Harry marries Meghan Markle at Windsor.
Twelve boys and their soccer coach are rescued from the flooded Tham Luang cave in Thailand.
France wins the FIFA World Cup in Russia.
The Camp Fire ignites in Butte County, California.
NASA's InSight probe lands on Mars.
Price record
| Date | Price | Kind |
|---|---|---|
| Oct 2026 | $895 | Asking price, not a saleU.S. retailer's discounted list price per 750 ml bottle. An asking price, not a sale. |
| Oct 2026 | $1,000 | Asking price, not a saleU.S. retailer list price per 750 ml bottle. An asking price, not a sale. |
This is an asking price, not a sale. It is what a seller wanted on the date shown. Asking prices often sit above what buyers pay, but an ask is not a ceiling: a sale can land on either side of it. It is not a value.
By reference price, Scarecrow Cabernet Sauvignon 2018 is number 53 of 100 in the wine entries of the FLOAT 100. 12 of those 100 rest on a realized sale; the rest carry an asking price or a guide value, and each page says which. Rank within the FLOAT 100 itself (39 here) is editorial: how much an object defines its field, not price alone.
Did you know
- The wine is named for the Scarecrow in The Wizard of Oz, a film J.J. Cohn helped make at MGM.
- The companion wine, M. Etain, takes its name from the French for 'Mr. Tin,' another Wizard of Oz character.
- Cohn's 1945 vines survived because he never replanted on AxR#1, the rootstock that phylloxera later destroyed across Napa.
- Grapes from the Scarecrow vineyard went into Opus One from 1979 through 2022.
- Bret Lopez spent his first career as a commercial photographer for brands like Levi's, Honda and Coca-Cola.
- The 2018 was picked by hand, at night.
How this page is made
- The figure
- One reference price, shown with its own kind. FLOAT does not average it with anything or adjust it for time.
- Realized or not
- A realized price is a completed sale. An asking price, an estimate and a price-guide value are not sales, and are labeled as such wherever they appear.
- The story
- Researched from published records and checked fact by fact. Updated Oct 1, 2026.
- Archive
- Oct 5, 2026