3.0... 3.0??? I know, I know, "but Beppe, you said Col Taylor SiB was one of the best ever, you even pushed it as your choice for Bourbon of the Year, how can you be so hard on the small batch? What gives?" That's just it, the SiB from 2019 really was one of the all time outstanding Col Taylors, a perfected display of the art form brought out in bursting sugars and full bodied barrel notes, from runny legs on glass to nose to final finish. In fact that's really the problem for Small Batch, it can't even hold a candle to big brother SiB, who shows it up in an almost embarrassing fashion. Both are 100 proof, both minimum 4 years BiBs, and yet Small Batch is no where near the mark that is set by the much much better SiB. The glaring difference starts at the nose where Small Batch doesn't bring out that rich deep maple syrup, but is just light in the sweet caramel notes, from then on it's much thinner at the front and even a little harsh in the finish, a factor that never reared it's head in the SiB. Really you can almost blame the SiB for showing up the issues with Small Batch, coming in the same Bottle in Bond form factor and yet not even comparable. Yet Col Taylor Small Batch is starting to see the higher price points set forth in many other Saz/BT product. At 30ish this would be a pretty acceptable bourbon, but at more than twice that, it's not even a decision. HARD PASS. Time for the folks at Sazerac and their BT fanbois to be taken down a peg. This Col Taylor just isn't that good. Cheers!