Can He Repeat His Perfect Record and Become Yokozuna?

The Aki basho was all Goeido, his sumo was superb, and not even the Yokozuna could stop him from achieving a perforce score, the much coveted Zensho Yusho. Harumafuji and Hakuho have achieved a few of these in the last decade, but for an Ozeki to score a perfect record in the Hakuho era is rare.

As a result, the Yokozuna Deliberation Council declared that should Goeido repeat his performance during the upcoming Kyushu basho, he would be promoted to Yokozuna. For more than a decade, Japan has been waiting for a Japanese rikishi to join the elite rank, and break the Mongolian monopoly on the Yokozuna rope.

During the summer break between Nagoya and Aki, it was clear that Goeido trained like a man possessed. He went into the fall tournament in Tokyo with the ignominy of being “Kadoban-Ozeki”. A loosing record in Tokyo would have demoted him to the lower ranks. The results of his intense training and re-dedication to his sumo was clear. Not only was he physically more powerful, his attitude was remarkably changed, and each bout saw him attack with total commitment to winning. In reviewing his matches, it’s nearly all offense;  offense that left no room for him to defend. His commitment to his skill and ability to prevail was total.

As a result, he became a hero. He has been on countless television shows, he has been a star attraction at the fall Jungo tour stops, and pretty much every distraction you can throw at a sumotori has been levied upon him.

The natural question comes about – how much has this degraded his sumo?

With just under 2 weeks to go before Kyushu starts, Tachiai suspects Goeido is training like a man possessed, knowing full well that this time, the final exam is Hakuho.

Sumo fans everywhere are wishing Goeido a good basho.