Jennifer and Terry Hoage moved their family to San Luis Obispo County in 2000 after Terry retired from the NFL’s Arizona Cardinals.
Terry Hoage was an All- American defensive back at the University of Georgia and had a 13-year career in the NFL. But when he and his wife, Jennifer, started a winery in Paso Robles, he was hesitant to use his name on the label.
“I didn’t think people would take seriously a football player making wine,” he says. But after searching for another suitable name, he took the advice of a friend, who told him to embrace his past. Thus was born Terry Hoage Vineyards.
It made sense. The Hoages are hands-on owners who collaborate on the winemaking. Terry even built the winery, using old wood recycled from barns in his native Iowa.
And they didn’t need to worry about being taken seriously. The Hoages are making some seriously good Rhonestyle wines. Terry, a genetics major, handles the scientific end of things; Jennifer makes most of the blending decisions. She “has an amazing palate,” Terry says of his wife.
The couple was living in Phoenix when Terry retired from the Arizona Cardinals. He says they were looking for “someplace small and grounded” to raise their two children. They found Templeton and liked the schools, so they moved in 2000. At the time, Terry says, he didn’t know much about Paso-area wines, but it didn’t take him long to catch on.
The first place they lived was on 10 acres, so Terry decided to put in a small vineyard as a hobby. He found that he liked farming. “I liked working outside,” he says. “I liked creating something.”
Along the way, he met Justin Smith, owner-winemaker of Saxum Vineyards. Smith knew of a place along Arbor Road that was for sale. It had five acres of syrah that had been planted by Rhone pioneer John Alban. Hoage says Smith told him: “You can make some really special wine off of that.”
He told his wife that if they bought the 26-acre property, he wanted to “do the wine thing.” She agreed, they took possession of the property on Sept. 1, 2002, and later that month they were harvesting grapes. Smith made the wines in the first two vintages, but the Hoages took over in 2004, at first using borrowed equipment to make the wines. They had also started expanding their vineyard, and they currently have 17 acres planted to a wide range of Rhone grapes, both red and white.
Production is small—about 2,400 cases a year—and the couple has given their wines proprietary names that refer both to wine and to Hoage’s football career. For example, there’s The Hedge, a syrah named for a pruning technique as well as the hedges around the University of Georgia football field. The Pick, a blend dominated by grenache, alludes to both the harvest and to a slang term for an interception.
Most of the 2005 wines are sold out, but on a recent visit I tasted many of the 2006s, which were blended and about to be bottled. The wines are tentatively scheduled to be released in May. About a third of the production is sold through a mailing list. To sign up, go to terryhoagevineyards.com.
The 2006 The Hedge ($45) offers jammy blackberry fruit, decent acidity, good balance and a long finish, while the 2006 The Skins ($36), made from grenache, displays pretty, rich strawberry and blackberry flavors and a supple texture. There are also some blends: The 2006 The 46 ($40), a grenachesyrah blend, has flavors of ripe blackberry, strawberry jam, a hint of anise and good structure; the 2006 The Pick ($38), a grenache-dominated blend of four varieties, is spicy and juicy, with ample strawberry fruit; and the 2006 5 Blocks Cuvee ($48), a syrah-based blend, is brimming with roasted berries and spice, supported by firm tannins.
For the most part, the Hoages are trying to make wines that they want to drink. “We’re looking for balance,” Jennifer says. They want the wines to have the ability to age. And they hope to keep the whole business from being too stuffy.
“I don’t want it to ever feel pretentious,” she says.
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