If Jed Steele wasn t a winemaker, he might be a basketball coach. The world-renowned vintner is known for his innovation and resourcefulness two important attributes that also served him well when he coached high school basketball in the mid-60s. According to Jed, a basketball coach and a winemaker share similar challenges. A coach may have players who are short and fast one year, tall and slow the next. Likewise, every harvest is different. The basketball coach adjusts the team s strategy to fit the players; the winemaker modifies vinification techniques each year to get the most from the grapes. There are lots of ways to skin a Zin, Jed is fond of saying. While he is passionate about his chosen field now, Jed s career aspirations initially didn t include winemaking, though he demonstrated an early interest in it. After earning a degree in psychology from Gonzaga University in Spokane, Wash., Jed worked crush in the cellar at Stony Hill. After two harvests there, he travelled to the east coast and went to work in the restaurant business. When his employers learned he knew something about California wine, they quickly expanded his responsibilities to include developing wine lists and wine buying. By 1971, Jed realized his work in and around the wine industry was more than coincidental. He had a calling. He chose to answer it by earning a master s degree in enology at University of California, Davis. Following graduation, Edmeades Vineyards recruited him to serve dual roles as both vineyard manager and winemaker. The winery was just getting started, and over his ten years there, Jed gained invaluable experience learning winemaking from the ground up. In 1983, he joined Kendall-Jackson as winemaker and general manager where he developed a national reputation for a distinctive style of blending juice from selected coastal regions. He left K-J in 1991 and has been making his own wine with his wife Marie since, in addition to collaborating with Villa Mt. Eden winemaker Mike McGrath. As director of enology at Villa Mt. Eden, Jed directs quality standards at the winery. He also brings to the winemaking team a talent for blending and an eclectic palate, which he says winemakers need to satisfy the tastes of the American public. Together with Mike, the two define Villa Mt. Eden s style. Over the course of a distinguished career that spans more than 25 years, Jed s wines have won honors too numerous to list. In 1978 he received the Best Paper of the Year for his research published in The American Journal Of Viticulture And Enology. He has been named Winemaker of the Year four times. He received the Robert Mondavi Trophy from the International Wine and Spirits Competition in London in 1990. Oh, and as an aide he still enjoys a competitive game of basketball as much as a good Zinfandel.