What a great tournament we just had! To me, what stood out is the large number of outstanding performances throughout the banzuke, from Hakuho‘s zensho yusho all the way down to Onosho‘s 10-5 record in his Makuuchi debut. Terunofuji got his Jun-yusho, and would have been in contention on the final day if not for his early hiccups on days 1 and 2. Takayasu handled the pressure and will be ozeki in Nagoya. Tamawashi may have started his own ozeki run, and has been fighting at that level. Mitakeumi and Yoshikaze held their own in San’yaku, and Shodai, Takakeisho, Tochinoshin, Hokutofuji, Ikioi, and Ura all put up great numbers in the maegashira ranks.
We don’t get the official Nagoya banzuke until June 26, but here are some early thoughts on the top and bottom of the banzuke.
The yokozuna ranks should get reshuffled as follows:
| Y1 | Hakuho | Harumafuji |
| Y2 | Kisenosato | Kakuryu |
We will have 3 ozeki: Terunofuji, Goeido, and Takayasu.
Tamawashi will keep his sekiwake rank, and Mitakeumi should join him.
Yoshikaze will keep his komusubi rank, and I think Kotoshogiku did just enough to only drop down to the other komusubi slot.
We should have a strong new crop of upper maegashira, who may even fare better than their predecessors at these ranks:
| M1 | Shodai | Takakeisho |
| M2 | Tochinoshin | Hokutofuji |
| M3 | Ikioi | Ura |
At the other end of the banzuke, Yutakayama, Myogiryu, and Toyohibiki will find themselves in Juryo, replaced in Makuuchi by Sadanoumi, Chiyomaru, and Nishigiki. I think Kaisei will just barely hang on to the top division at M16. They could swap him with Gagamaru, but what would be the point?
Full banzuke prediction to come once I’ve had some time to digest Natsu.
You are a brave man to embrace the ranking chaos coming from this basho! I look forward to your predictions.
Haha, according to my spreadsheet, this one isn’t actually that bad, although there’s a lot of parity in the lower maegashira ranks.
After my last very heavy month got in the way of giving it too much thought last time round, I will have a lot more time on my hands soon to give the Nagoya banzuke a proper go and give some explanation as to my pickings!
I am also incredibly psyched for seeing Ura up against the sanyaku ranks next time when he gets shoved up into one of the top Maegashira ranks!
Yes, and if he’s ranked M3w as I currently predict, he might not get too heavy a load of San’yaku if everyone is healthy. With 11 San’yaku rikishi, it’s the top 5 maegashira who really get hammered, unless someone in the upper ranks goes kyujo and M3w and lowers wrestlers get pulled up.
Based on recent basho it wouldn’t be too surprising to see the Yokozuna/ ozeki ranks have at least one Kyujo rikishi by the midway point
M3w is still going to face at least Harumafuji, Terunofuji, Kisenosato and Takayasu though, so it not being part of the top 16 isn’t worth that much right now, even before the possibility of kyujo.
You think that the ultimate plan of the Kokonoe Beya is to fill up the top division with their stable enough so that nobody fights anyone? :)
I think that there’s going to be a Kaisei/Gagamaru switch, just out of spite. I think that it’ll be fun to see what happens in the middle ranks… because, dang.
That was one heck of a basho.
Kaisei and Gagamaru should face each other in a play-off. The winner gets to fight in makuuchi in July. the loser pays for lunch.
I know! Maybe they’re waiting for Aioyama to come and join them? They can all hang out together in the ‘big dude’ contingent. Maybe form their own division. :)
It does seem that way at times. It must give the schedulers absolute fits.
I am very excited to see what Nagoya has in store.
I was lucky enough to get tickets for day 9 till day 15 of Nagoya, so hopefully I will get to see some great matches in person!
Here’s hoping that you get a chance to see Takayasu win and Kisenosato having to hold the flag in the parade! :)
That is amazing news. If you have not yet seen a basho in person, I found it a wonderful experience. So happy you get to go.
Thankyou!
I was lucky enough to see the first day of the January 2017 basho in Tokyo,and this started my love of sumo.
Does anyone happen to know what the announcement was after Tamawashi’s bout? Somebody clapped together wooden blocks during the announcement and he received arrows from the gyoji. It happened after the terunofuji match too but he did not receive the arrows.
There are a series of announcement connected with the final 3 bouts on the final 3 days. They are steeped in tradition back to the days when the rikishi received in order (from 3rd to final bout) – Arrows, a Bow String and a Bow as prizes in addition to kensho. If you look at the final match, in addition to the kensho pile handed to Hakuho, there is a usher standing by with a really nice bow. It’s the same as what is used in the bow twirling ceremony.
My banzuke spreadsheet spat out a more or less identical result after I fixed the bug which (too complicated and boring to explain, honestly). The only difference is that I had Endo hanging on and getting the M3w slot ahead of Ura. I also agree that Kaisei will just survive at M16e.
I have Endo just below at M4e.