Kaisei (now Tomozuna) as tachi-mochi; Tomozuna (now Oshima) as shimpan
Monday morning brought the banzuke, and with it, the news that fan favorite Kaisei had officially dropped from Juryo and landed in Makushita. Shortly thereafter the Kyokai announced that he had retired but would stay in the Kakukai (sumo world) as Tomozuna-oyakata in Oshima-beya.
Fans may recognize the name as the elder name former Kyokutenho had been using until he switched to Oshima earlier this year. While Kyokutenho was active he was originally recruited to Oshima stable but when the stablemaster retired, he joined Tomozuna beya becoming a stablemate with Kaisei. When Kyokutenho retired, the Oshima kabu (stock) was available so he claimed it but when Tomozuna’s master retired, Kyokutenho jumped at the chance to lead the stable — so he switched to Tomozuna. Then earlier this year, Kyokutenho reacquired the Oshima kabu, renaming Tomozuna-beya, Oshima-beya.
Now that Kaisei has retired, he has taken the Tomozuna kabu which was the name of the stable he had originally fought under. And all is right with the world. Peace and Order shall now be restored in the land.
Got that? No? The next dashboard I build will have a Gantt chart to explain it. Failing that, I may just take a picture of the little diagram I drew to help me get it squared away.
The crazy thing is, I was going through a bunch of pictures that Nicola had taken to find one of Kaisei during his heyday. It was this wild stroll down memory lane. Kiribayama battling Ichiyamamoto in Makushita. Then, the Makuuchi dohyo-iri: Kotoshogiku was there, Ikioi…the list goes on…and the tears well up. Well, one of the pics is from the Yokozuna dohyo-iri. Hakuho was Yokozuna and Kaisei was his sword-bearer, Ishiura his dew-sweeper. The three ascend the dohyo in unison. Pan out a little bit — and would you look at that? Ex-Kyokutenho (now Oshima, then Tomozuna) is the shimpan, sitting ringside. Wild, no? As I said, all is right in the world.
Over his 16 year career, Kaisei won the Juryo yusho, a couple of Makuuchi jun-yusho (2nd place), and three fighting spirit prizes. I, for one, am happy that he is staying in sumo and am eager to see the talent he helps develop as coach.
The long-awaited Aki banzuke is out, and any attemptto divine what the banzuke committee would do under the unprecedented circumstances turned out to be a fool’s errand. The general principle with regard to the COVID withdrawals seems to have been to freeze the ranks of everyone who left before recording 8 wins or 8 losses, and to promote/demote those who did clinch a winning/losing record, but the application was far from consistent.
The named ranks
First, the obvious placements. Terunofuji (11-4) remains the sole East Yokozuna. East Ozeki Takakeisho (11-4) keeps his spot, while fellow Ozeki Shodai (10-5) moves up from O2w to O1w. Likewise, East Sekiwake Wakatakakage (8-7) stays where he is.
Things get less predictable from here. As widely expected, Mitakeumi (2-4*) gets to keep his Ozeki rank, but switches spots with Shodai. Presumably, he’ll be kadoban again, though I haven’t heard anything official. The next big question was what to do with S1w Daieisho (6-6*). As I expected, they concluded that it would be unfair for him to lose his rank. But, apparently, they also decided that it would be unfair for him to block K1e Hoshoryu (9-6) from moving up, even though the Komusubi did not post the 11 wins that normally warrant an extra Sekiwake slot. So, he will make his Sekiwake debut at S1w, with Daiesho at S2e.
With Hoshoryu moving up, Abi (8-7) slides over from K1w to K1e, opening up a Komusubi slot. As expected, this goes to the July champion Ichinojo (12-3 at M2w). And, at least in these circumstances, an 8-7 record at M1e is apparently still enough to create an extra Komusubi slot, so Kiribayama will be K2w. I expected a 10-member san’yaku, with exactly this composition, but I thought it would be 2 Sekiwake and 4 Komusubi, not 3 of each, and had Daieisho and Hoshoryu in the wrong rank order.
The rank and file
With the two extra san’yaku slots, and the top division fixed at 42 rikishi, the M17 rank disappears, so we’re looking at M1-M16. And we got an answer to one key question right at M1e. It seemed like M2e Kotonowaka (7-3*) would have by far the strongest case, as even a single win in the 5 bouts he missed would have made him a lock. But the banzuke committee decided not to promote anyone with fewer than 8 wins (or fewer than 4, in the lower divisions). For Kotonowaka, the difference is a single rank, but for others (most prominently Ichiyamamoto in the top division, but also the likes of Oshoma in Juryo and Oshoryu in Makushita), the cost was much higher. So instead, M6w Tobizaru (8-4*), who just got his 8th win before pulling out, will occupy the top maegashira rank, despite having the same win-loss differential as Kotonowaka and being ranked 9 spots lower.
Applying the same logic, I would have expected to see M8w Nishikigi (8-4*) at M1w, but apparently he wasn’t given credit for a full 4-win differential, as the M1w and M2w ranks instead went to M11w Midorifuji (10-5) and M10w Meisei (9-6), respectively, representing historically large over-promotions. After that, the committee simply left the M3 rikishi (Tamawashi, 5-7* and Ura, 7-8) in place to avoid additional over-promotions, and finally slotted in Nishikigi at M4e, followed by the absent Takayasu at M4w.
Among other decisions that struck me as odd, Endo (3-9*) falls only from M5e to M6w; I guess his is the flip side of Nishikigi’s case, so that the movement is in the right direction but by fewer ranks than expected based on win-loss differential (in effect, they were treated as though they went 8-7 for Nishikigi and 6-9 for Endo). Takanosho, with only one win at M1w, was lucky to only drop to M10w, while the bias against Juryo rikishi pushed division champion Ryuden (12-3 at J1e) down to M12w; nevertheless, he returns to the top division.
As expected, leaving the division are M9e Shimanoumi (1-14), M17w Chiyomaru (6-9), and M16w Daiamami (2-10*). All of them put up rank-record combinations that were impossible to keep, but Ryuden had the only legitimate promotion case, so the replacements who will occupy the now-lowest M16 rank must count themselves very lucky. They are J4 Mitoriyu (9-6) and J8 Hiradoumi (10-5), both making their top-division debuts. They took rather different paths to get here. Mitoryu (28 years old) entered ozumo at Ms15TD back in 2017, reached Juryo by January 2018, and then stayed there for 27 consecutive tournaments (four and a half years). Hiradoumi actually started earlier, in 2016, via the more standard maezumo route, and is only 22. He took almost 6 years to get to Juryo, but is jumping up to Makuuchi after only 5 basho in the second division.
If you’ve read this far, you deserve a bonus. Former Ozeki Asanoyama’s Sandanme yusho saw him move up to M15e. While we had a good general idea of where he’d be ranked, the precise placement is important, as M15 is the lowest rank at which a 7-0 record means a near-automatic promotion to Juryo, potentially shortening Asanoyama’s return to the top division (and, dare we hope, his highest rank?) by an entire basho compared to being placed one rank lower.
I’ll wrap it up here, but there’s no shortage of discussion points for this highly unusual banzuke, so let me know what you think in the comments.
It’s the magical time on the sumo calendar again, we are anticipating the release of the banzuke for the upcoming Aki basho in about 6 hours from now. The sumo world is waiting to see how they sorted the mess of COVID kyujo out, and where yusho winner Ichinojo ends up. While we are waiting, feel free to take a look at some forecasting from Team Tachiai’s resident master forecaster, lksumo.
In just over two weeks the sumo world will be gearing up for Aki and I cannot wait. The banzuke will be out in a few days and we’ll be digesting all of the moves. It will be a unique situation and we’ll probably see some unprecedented “banzuke luck” for wrestlers with several losses and incomplete records at Nagoya, the chief beneficiary being Ozeki Mitakeumi. Mitakeumi also missed out on a portion of the jungyo because of another positive test at Dewanoumi beya.
Takayasu’s situation will be more straightforward since he missed the entire tournament. To get himself primed for action he’s been among the more active wrestlers venturing to other stables for degeiko. In the video here, he’s taking on Yokozuna Terunofuji at Isegahama stable. He’d also visited Tatsunami earlier in the break. We’ve also seen Takasago simultaneously hosting Miyagino, Asakayama, and Naruto.
So, as we’ve seen here and over the past couple of weeks, sumo stables are easing back into pre-pandemic rituals: degeiko, Jungyo, and vacations. This must signal a shift in the Sumo Association’s Covid policies in order to avoid another mass kyujo mess. But Mitakeumi’s kyujo from the last day of Jungyo, after just recently having Covid, would suggest that we’re in for another raft of Covid kyujo. Especially given the sudden openness, however, I wonder if the testing regime won’t be scrapped altogether, or at least significantly altered (if there were already some exceptions to testing for those who had recovered from their infections).
In our kids’ schools last year, there was a weekly testing regimen. Kids who tested positive for Covid were sent home for a period that would follow the latest guidelines. But in a crucial element for us sumo fans — those students were not retested for 90 days because people can still be shedding the virus and testing positive after they’re no longer infectious.
If a similar protocol were put in place for rikishi who tested positive and were kyujo from Nagoya, it’s possible that a large chunk of wrestlers wouldn’t even be tested before Aki…if they still conduct the pre-basho testing, at all. Otherwise, one would think there would have to be a surge in positive cases during pre-basho testing.
Personally, I wouldn’t be surprised if testing will only be required for those who are symptomatic with kyujo for positive tests, and mask wearing (off the dohyo) for those who have been in close contact. Let’s take a look at the four-stable degeiko I mentioned above.
Takasago hosted a good crew of three other stables: Asakayama, Miyagino, and Naruto. Enho had several “smaller” wrestlers to spar with and help coach, from Ishizaki to Asakiryu. Unfortunately, I did not see Ishiura and have not heard any news on that front. If someone else has, please leave it in the comments.
I really want to see the return of happy Asanoyama. Takasago shared some great video of the former Ozeki taking on Oshoma. The last year must have been rough and he’s just starting to claw his way back. From top dog, he’s now 8th in the chanko queue. As for Oshoma, covid kyujo put an early end to the latter wrestler’s sekitori debut. Both wrestlers are certainly eager to put their best foot forward.
It would be unreasonable to demote wrestlers like him who posted more wins than losses but I wonder if he may actually receive a modest promotion out of this. The bigger question, which will be answered in a few days, is how to handle wrestlers with losing records before their exit? Sometimes wrestlers are able to recover in week two but these wrestlers lost that opportunity.
After keiko, though, out came the pick-axes. The keiko-ba was destroyed in that great ritual of renewal. The stable will rebuild the fighting surface and to complete the process, a gyoji will perform a ceremony like a small scale dohyo matsuri, to bless it. The pictures below show the process of destruction.
