Dave Roberts and Rich Aurilia bonded over wine as teammates. Now it's a business for them

A great wine is pleasurable and smooth, with a long, satisfying finish. It makes you wonder where it’s been all your life.

In other words, it’s nothing like the relationship between Dave Roberts and Rich Aurilia when they were National League West rivals.

Every time Roberts stepped to the plate, Aurilia cringed.

Pesky left-handed hitter that he was, Roberts tended to either drag bunt down the first-base line or punch the hole between shortstop and third base, forcing Aurilia into a despised shift.

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Whenever he reached second base, the amiable Roberts, even as a Dodger, greeted the shortstop from the San Francisco Giants, prompting more uneasiness.

“He would always try to say ‘Hi’ to me,” Aurilia said, “and I would just kind of give a little head nod.”

In 2007, their rivalry took on a new form when Roberts and Aurilia became Giants teammates. Fans of cult Cabernet Sauvignons from Napa Valley, they would bring wine onto the team plane, seeing who could procure the most lip-smacking bottle.

When a knee injury ended Roberts’ career after the 2008 season, he called Aurilia and John Micek, another friend and fellow wine lover, to ask if they would like to go into the wine business together. It was an easy yes.

“It’s something where you’re just trying to figure out, what are you going to do after baseball?” Roberts said. “And we wanted to just make great wines.”

The trio formed Red Stitch, the wine label’s name not only a nod to their beloved sport but also the bonds that have held them together through 17 vintages. Roberts’ two World Series titles as Dodgers manager have provided the friends a reason to toast, even if one of the raised glasses is more of a salute to the man than his team.

“I mean, listen, you don’t see me standing in front of the TV during the playoffs rooting for the Dodgers, I’ll say that,” said Aurilia, now part of the Giants’ pre- and postgame television broadcast team. “But I do want to see my friend do well; it would be way better if it was for another team, but it is what it is and you try and make the best of it.”

A few days after Christmas, a line to meet the manager of the defending World Series champions and have him sign bottles of Red Stitch stretched to the end of one aisle inside the Los Feliz Costco.

Seated below a picture of himself celebrating the Dodgers’ most recent title, Roberts made sure the wait was worth it. He warmly greeted each customer, thanked them for the inevitable congratulations and patiently posed for pictures.

One man wearing a UCLA shirt couldn’t resist a lighthearted jab at the manager and former Bruins outfielder who had taken so much guff over repeated playoff stumbles.

“You’re doing a good job,” the man said as he plopped a bottle into a cardboard box. “I don’t care what anybody says.”

Roberts chuckled as he signed bottles of the 2021 Sierra Mar Vineyard Chardonnay ($30.09) and 2020 Coombsville Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon ($69.09).

Among those at the event who had tasted Roberts’ wines was Jeff Woolson, a longtime family friend who described the Chardonnay as “not buttery but really minerally and clean.” Woolson said he hoarded the Red Stitch Cabernet Sauvignons and broke them out reluctantly even after receiving a generous friends and family discount.

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Friends aren’t the only ones salivating over these wines. Critics have routinely lavished scores in the low to mid-90 points (using a 100-point scale) on nearly the entire portfolio of Red Stitch, which also includes Pinot Noirs from Sonoma and Santa Lucia Highlands. The Cabernets feature luscious fruit and a tannic structure that lends itself to ageability; the Pinot Noirs and Chardonnays are Burgundian in style, meaning they are elegant and approachable regardless of whether they are paired with a meal or sipped alone.

Awarding the 2022 Sierra Mar Vineyard Chardonnay a 93-point rating, which places it on the high end of its “excellent” range, Wine Enthusiast characterized the wine as exhibiting “enticing layers of Meyer lemon, softened butter, white flower and blanched almond on the nose of this single-vineyard expression. The palate is sharp in acidity and stony in minerality, with a creamy, rich core.”

Roberts’ love of wine goes back to his days playing for the Dodgers.

During a trip to Napa Valley with teammate Shawn Green and their wives in 2002, Roberts found himself captivated by not just the wines but also the proprietors and vintners who openly shared knowledge of their industry.

“That really opened up a new world,” Roberts said, “and it’s funny, that’s where my wife coined the term ‘Napa Dave’ because when I’m in the Napa Valley, I’m not worried about my cellphone, I’m not worried about work and I’m present and so for me that’s something that you realize that to be present is so powerful.”

After signing with San Francisco before the 2006 season, Roberts was delighted to find he was teammates with another wine nut when he went out to dinner with Aurilia.

Ironically, the wine that helped cement their bond came from one of baseball’s most polarizing stars. Given several bottles of Cabernet Sauvignon by a winemaker as a thank you for a signed bat and jersey, Barry Bonds knew who would appreciate them most.

“Barry wasn’t a wine guy, so he walked right over to us, because he knew we were wine guys,” Aurilia said, referring to himself and Roberts, “and gave us like a six-pack of Mi Sueño. We took it on one of the flights and we both really loved it.”

That offseason, Roberts and Aurilia visited Mi Sueño, just south of downtown Napa, and met with the winemaker, Rolando Herrera. His backstory as a Mexican immigrant who rose from dishwasher to having his wines served at a White House dinner that President George W. Bush hosted for Mexican counterpart Vicente Fox was the quintessential American dream. The name of Herrera’s winery, which means “my dream,” reflected his unlikely path.

Once Roberts and Aurilia joined forces with Micek, whom they had befriended at a blind malbec tasting at Micek’s home in the Noe Valley section of San Francisco, it was an easy choice to go with Herrera as the winemaker for their new venture.

But some things never change. Even as teammates once more, Roberts and Aurilia occasionally let their old rivalry seep to the surface.

“When you watch a Dodgers game with Rich,” Micek said, “there’s a little bit of, God, it’s just ridiculous how they were able to build this team.”

Each winter, the scene repeats itself as part of a cherished tradition.

As if following a baseball superstition, the Red Stitch partners and their respective wives — Tricia Roberts, Amy Aurilia and Noelle Micek — take the same seats at the same table at Herrera’s winery for their annual Cabernet Sauvignon blending session.

Resting in front of them are five empty wine glasses. On the credenza to the right are half-bottles of Cabernet Sauvignon, each representing a sample of wine from a lot within one of three vineyards. Each bottle is labeled only with a letter, A through E.

Over the next five hours or so, they will blind taste each lot, taking notes as they go. There’s no talking other than maybe a few jokes about dinner from the previous night.

Are they sipping or spitting?

“I think the answer is yes — a little bit of both,” John Micek said. “I think at one point, one of us might have received a T-shirt that said, ‘My stomach is my dump bucket’ but in reality, this is about families and friends and I think that’s what makes this wine so special.”

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Once everyone has prioritized their favorite lots, Herrera starts creating different blends, which are rated anew. The process continues until the team feels that nothing more can be done to enhance the blend.

It's then that Herrera reveals the percentage each vineyard contributed to the final blend, but only after inserting a past vintage of Red Stitch into the mix unbeknownst to the tasters. Without fail, the group picks it as its favorite.

“You see people starting to smile,” John Micek said of identifying a previous vintage of their wine, “and they’re trying not to say anything.”

The group will reunite three months later once the wine has been put into barrel to make the final blend, adding a tiny percentage of Malbec or Petit Verdot to enhance the flavor and ensure it aligns with the Red Stitch style.

“They’re approachable, I think that they’re all age-worthy,” Dave Roberts said when asked to describe his wines, “and I think that there’s balance and there’s good acidity with all three” varietals.

For several years, Red Stitch produced only a Cabernet Sauvignon, making about 100 cases.

Growth came unexpectedly, like a general manager calling a minor league prospect to say he had made the big leagues.

Winemaker Dan Kosta called Aurilia during one harvest to tell him that Gary Pisoni and Gary Franscioni, two of the world’s foremost grape growers, would be willing to sell some of their prized Pinot Noir from the Santa Lucia Highlands in central Monterey County.

“The offer just kind of jumped in our laps,” Aurilia said, “so we took advantage of it.”

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Once the Red Stitch owners wanted to host dinners and events featuring their wines, they realized they didn’t want to serve someone else’s white wines. Thus originated their Chardonnay out of Santa Lucia Highlands, later joined by Pinot Noir from Sonoma County.

Since Red Stitch uses only purchased grapes, they must be schlepped to Herrera’s winemaking facilities as part of a heavily orchestrated process. In past vintages, fruit sometimes picked after midnight was hauled by refrigerated truck to avoid heat spikes that would cause the grapes to retain too much sugar and raise the alcohol level to tipsy-after-a-glass range.

Starting with the 2024 vintage, the Red Stitch Pinot Noir and Chardonnay is hauled to Sonoma as part of the label's transition for those varietals to winemaker Erich Bradley, who connected Micek with Roberts and Aurilia through mutual conversations leading to their first joint tasting. (Herrera will continue to make the label's Cabernet Sauvignon.)

Case production has soared to 1,500, which remains relatively small by industry standards. There have been discussions about making a red blend at a lower price point to broaden the label’s appeal and entice distributors given that Red Stitch is sold in just seven states.

“We’re pretty much a little mom-and-pop shop,” Aurilia said, “but we get it done.”

Considering his day job, Roberts has ceded the business side of the operation to his co-owners, taking on more of an ambassador role. He readily shares Red Stitch with his players and keeps a stash inside Dodger Stadium.

“My office is being redone as we speak,” Roberts said at the Costco event in late December, “so the wine fridge needs to get bigger.”

At a time when his team was making one big acquisition after another, Roberts said there were parallels between making a good wine and managing a championship team.

“With wine,” Roberts said, “it’s about Mother Nature, it’s about the soil, it’s about the weather and as a winemaker you want to stay out of the way and when you’re not talking about the winemaker, you’re doing your job.

“As a manager, it’s about the players and when you let the players shine and not intervene too often and make it about the players, the team flourishes.”

Prosper the Dodgers have, leading to some grudging acceptance from that longtime Giant.

“When you have a partner whose team goes out and wins the World Series,” Aurilia said, “it’s not going to be a bad thing for your brand.”

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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.