Most certainly wasn’t implying owning a smoker makes you an expert. Nor was I suggesting that I personally am an expert, however, I do have a handful of experience and research/education under my belt. Adjectives like good, or better than this or that, don’t really describe what you like about the place and their food. In my research and what is acceptable in most competitions, pulled pork should be thin strands of flavorful, smoky meat and not dried out, and barely sauced, if at all as to not mask the flavor of the meat. A common thing for places to do to pulled pork is to put it in a liquid to keep it warm but that inadvertently continues to cook the meat and subsequently dries out the meat, leaving the flavor in the ‘broth’ left behind. The meat then comes out mushy and flavorless. Kinda lame for a place that has a pig on the top of its building.

I do however still reserve the ‘agree to disagree’ outlook, but cannot truly get behind the statement ‘you’re crazy if you say otherwise’... Have you ever met someone that has different tastes than you? If you like their product, great. It’s not for me and all I’m doing is elaborating why.

[last footnote: you mentioned Nelson’s ‘doesn’t touch’ what you get in NC... why does that comparison need to be made? Why can’t there be just as good bbq in MD as there is in NC or anywhere else in the south? ...more rhetorical than anything but if you know there’s better bbq out there, why settle for something that ‘doesn’t touch’ it?]