The action of the past fortnight comes down to these few matches. It’s been a wild, entertaining ride. We came into the tournament with several storylines but those shifted during the tournament. We end with a strong class of Ozeki, a few contenders, and a crop of impressive young wrestlers beginning to develop.
Atamifuji is quickly becoming a favorite. After a rather timid debut to the division, he is establishing himself in this second go around. But he is not destined for the lower rungs of Makuuchi. He has been a player in the yusho for two consecutive tournaments. Two jun-yusho, and the accompanying special prizes suggest he will find a home in sanyaku. He will have new rivalries, perhaps Kotonowaka, Gonoyama and others.
Meanwhile, the newbies at the Ozeki rank, Kirishima and Hoshoryu, are finally establishing themselves with solid tournaments…Kirishima with potentially his second yusho. We will not have a kadoban Ozeki in the New Year and we have a couple of guys who might be able to start their own Ozeki runs.
But we can talk about that later, for now, let’s get to the action.
Makuuchi
Nishikifuji (6-9)defeated Kagayaki (5-10). Kagayaki charged forward sending both to the floor. A mono-ii was called but it was determined the bout was too close to call. In the rematch, Kagayaki quickly secured an overarm grip with his left hand but Nishikifuji dominated with his right hand inside. He was able to press forward and force Kagayaki out. Yorikiri.
Hiradoumi (9-6) defeated Kitanowaka (5-10). Kitanowaka wouldn’t let Hiradoumi inside by using powerful tsuppari. But Hiradoumi caught him pitched too far forward and pulled him down to the ground. Hikiotoshi.
Ryuden (10-5) defeated Tsurugisho (9-6). Ryuden forced Tsurugisho into reverse. Tsurugisho stepped out gingerly. Yorikiri.
Oho (8-7) defeated Mitakeumi (8-7). Oho cornered Mitakeumi resisted forcefully at the bales, resulting in a brief stalemate. Mitakeumi used his left hand to sweep through Oho, likely attempting a twisting throw but this forced both to tumble out. Gunbai Oho. No mono-ii. Oshidashi.
Myogiryu (6-9) defeated Tomokaze (7-8) Tomokaze did not like Myogiryu’s nodowa, so he pulled to escape. Myogiryu pursued and pushed him out. Oshidashi.
Roga (5-10) defeated Endo (5-10). Endo pressed forward and seemed to have good control until he tried to shift his grip to a double-inside. Roga locked up Endo’s right arm in an armbar and pulled, forcing him to the ground. Kotenage.
Ichiyamamoto (11-4) defeated Kinbozan (8-7). Ichiyamamoto gets a Fighting Spirit Prize with the win. And win he did, with a quick slapdown. Remember Kinbozan hurt his arm/shoulder yesterday. He didn’t have much in the way of offense today. Hatakikomi.
Churanoumi (9-6) defeated Midorifuji (9-6). This was a very active bout. Churanoumi’s early plan was a pull and slapdown. But Midorifuji kept his balance and charged forward forcing Churanoumi to backpedal. Churanoumi realized he needed to change up his plan so he pressed forward and secured Midorifuji’s belt with his right hand inside. Midorifuji tried to use a kotenage but Churanoumi countered by wrapping his right foot around Midorifuji and then pressing forward. Oshidashi.
Gonoyama (8-7) defeated Shonannoumi (7-8). Darwin Match. Shonannoumi forced to reset, then Gonoyama jumped early. Finally the combatants leapt in sync. Shonannoumi pulled but Gonoyama’s forward churning sumo won, in the end. Oshidashi.
Sadanoumi (8-7) defeated Tobizaru (7-8). Darwin Match. Sadanoumi tried to end it quickly with a throw but Tobizaru slipped from his grip. Tobizaru could not press Sadanoumi forward so he pulled but Sadanoumi pursued well. Yorikiri.
Halftime
Takayasu (10-5) defeated Tamawashi (9-6). Takayasu was a bit slow with his tachiai, and Tamawashi a bit eager, so he false started. When they got the timing right, Takayasu pulled and shifted directions, letting Tamwashi’s momentum carry him off the dohyo.
Meisei (4-11) defeated Tohakuryu (5-10). Tohakuryu pulled, again. Meisei caught him out and pressed forward. Tohakuryu’s pulling brand of sumo will be sent back to Juryo. Oshidashi. Regular readers will be familiar with my disdain for this type of sumo but new readers may wonder, “Takayasu literally just won with pulling sumo but you don’t give him crap. What gives?” Fair enough. But Takayasu can do what Takayasu wants. He’s not defined by his pull. He uses it as a tool…one of many. Tohakuryu is discovering that if the pull is your “brand of sumo,” a Makuuchi opponent will be prepared to let you run yourself off the dohyo. Tohakuryu seemed to be relying on this one tactic far too much to be successful here.
Shodai (6-9) defeated Takarafuji (6-9). Shodai pulled and Takayasu pushed. Gunbai to Takarafuji. Mono-ii. They decided they went out at the same time so they ordered a torinaoshi, rematch. In the rematch, Shodai may have saved himself by switching his grip to a morozashi, double-inside grip. Once he secured that, he countered Takarafuji at the edge and then pressed forward, pushing Takarafuji over the bales. Oshidashi.
Ura (8-7) defeated Hokuseiho (7-8). Darwin Match. Ura slipped from Hokuseiho’s grasp and locked onto Hokuseiho with an arm bar, spun him around and then drove forward pushing him over. Oshitaoshi.
Nishikigi (7-8) defeated Hokutofuji (5-10). Hokutofuji charged forward strongly but a bit blindly as Nishikigi dragged him forward and down. Hatakikomi.
Asanoyama (4-4-7) defeated Abi (6-9). Strong Abi-zumo met stronger Asanoyama. Abi was driving into Asanoyama’s face but Asanoyama got pissed off and reared up, driving into Abi from the side. This redirected Abi’s attack into the void…and let gravity do the rest. Tsukiotoshi.
Wakamotoharu (6-9) defeated Onosho (3-12). Yorikiri. A matta probably should have been called but wasn’t. Wakamotoharu drove Onosho quickly out. This bout will be forgotten since it was relatively meaningless but it’s another case of, “fight until you hear the gyoji.” This only becomes an issue when it happens in a big match and someone thinks they should have had a matta.
Kotonowaka (11-4) defeated Atamifuji (11-4). Atamifuji won a Fighting Spirit prize, unconditionally but Kotonowaka’s is conditional on a win here. Atamifuji’s Outstanding performance prize is conditional on a yusho, so he’d have to win here, have Kirishima lose, AND defeat Kirishima in the subsequent playoff. But in the end, Kotonowaka met Atamifuji head on and then shifted to the right, letting Atamifuji flop to the floor…aided by a gentle push from the left hand. Hikiotoshi.
Hoshoryu (10-5) defeated Daieisho (9-6). Daieisho went through all that cupping for nothing. Hoshoryu got inside Daieisho’s cannons quickly, wrapped him up, and forced him over the edge. Yorikiri.
Kirishima (13-2) defeated Takakeisho (9-6). Kensho applause. Takakeisho slow-rolls his tachiai. Matta. Kirishima met Takakeisho head on at the tachiai but quickly shifted right, and Takakeisho fell forward. Kirishima hits 13 wins and walks away with a fat stack of kensho to fund his yusho party.
Wrap-Up
Congratulations, Kirishima! And Congratulations Atamifuji and the other Sansho winners!
On the data front, it’s clear that we are in a new era of sumo. The aged, dominant veterans of the past few years have joined their elders in blue jackets (and even a few black hakama). It will take quite a bit of time to build up another set of great rivals. But we have certainly noticed how many “first time bouts” there have been every day this tournament. I’ll try to quantify that a bit better and see if we can trace that metric back through the past twenty years or so. I will not be surprised if this is near a peak for the most “first time bouts”.
My hypothesis is that the “Hakuho era” was not just down to him. He had great rivalries with Harumafuji, Kisenosato, Kotoshogiku, Kakuryu…guys who faced him, and each other, over and over for more than a decade. The key is, those guys were at the top and consistently defeating the guys who would fly in and out of their lives for the first 10 days of the tournament…before this half-dozen guys would set upon themselves basho-after-basho for years. I think that we will need time to see another class of legends and great rivals establish themselves in the division and we are just seeing the first few sprouts of those new rivalries.
While we fete Kirishima on his yusho, we should also celebrate the successes of these young up-and-comers because they will be carrying the sport for the next decade.
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I love ura
Here’s the query you want to get first-time meetings between two rikishi ranked in makuuchi; divide by 2 to get the actual number. Looks like the record was 67 in January of 2012; not sure if this has something to do with the scandals of the previous couple of years but July and November of 2011 are also in the top 3. This basho had 40, which puts it 18th of 142 basho this century. You can have fun with the full data set: http://sumodb.sumogames.de/Query_bout.aspx?show_form=0&group_by=basho&year=2000-now&m=on&hth=1&samed1=on&hthwins1=0&samed2=on&hthwins2=0
What I really want is a list of rivalries sorted by number of bouts, listing only active wrestlers.
That might be tough to do without going basho-by-basho
Ura komosubi…… please!!!!!!
I think that’s a given, at this point!
I first randomly channel surfed to sumo in July 2016, I think, and started officially following it in January 2017, with Kisenosato’s ill-starred promotion to yokozuna.
So all the time I’ve been watching, the ozeki rank has seemed kind of snake-bit and futile. Without rehashing the gory details you all know perfectly well, this has seemed like an era of unlucky and unhappy ozeki-dom. (A clear exception was Terunofuji on his return, but he zipped up to yokozuna so quickly that his second stint at ozeki barely registered.)
With ozeki now taking yusho and (gasp) retaining their rank, I feel we’ve finally returned to what I think is a more normal state of affairs, with a strong cadre of ozeki.
Speaking of ozeki: in the quick basho recap montage that ended the NHK live broadcast, I noticed how they juxtaposed a clip of Kirishima giving a defeated opponent a hand up, and Hoshoryu glaring down at the man he had just thrown off the dohyo (Gonoyama, maybe?). Message sent.
Re your Ozeki observation, yeah, that’s something that has puzzled me. I grew up watching sumo in the early ‘60s (Taiho, Kashiwado etc.). I can’t ever recall an Ozeki getting demoted. They’d go up…but not down.
Then I lost track of sumo and the first I can recall seeing “former Ozeki” was in reference to Kotoshogiku. Now? It seems it’s the norm!
I hope this current group offers some stability.
That’s merely because the standard alternative to “go up” wasn’t “go down” then, it was “retire before rank is lost”, even if they weren’t particularly old yet. Anyway, they had extra protection until 1969, it took three consecutive losing records to lose the rank, not just two.
This is a bit of a tangent but, your history of watching sumo matches mine exactly. I stumbled on to it just like you. I get the feeling (from podcasts and comments on reddit etc.) that a lot of people found sumo at about the same time. I’ve been wondering why; did NHK start broadcasting in the US or making their stuff available to cable companies about six or seven years ago? I’d been curious about sumo but never seen it. Now I’m totally absorbed. Sorry for the digression.
I got drawn in by this at about the same time: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-sumo-matchup-centuries-in-the-making/
I’m sure the streams help. For me, it was similar. ESPN, late at night in the 90s had digest shows where they would compress a whole basho into a 30 minute show, hosted by Larry Biel. I think the YouTube streams, Jason, Kintamayama, Natto, going back to Araibira…I am sure they get more exposure for the sport. Now there’s Twitter and Instagram and such; sumo seems perfect for Twitter since bouts can be so short.
Digress all you like. This blog exists so that fans can chat about and learn more about it and connect with other fans.
Not sure what to think about both Mitakeumi and Endo right now. My brain is saying, “They’ve both peaked and won’t get back to the top”, but my heart disagrees. I hope both of them come back next basho and do better.
Takakeisho is reminding me of Goeido right now. That’s not an insult, since Goeido stayed an Ozeki for a long time, but I think his dreams of being Yokozuna aren’t going to happen. He’s already struggling and his former dominance is nowhere to be found.
I’m hopeful that both Kotonowaka and Daeisho will reach Ozeki in the next basho or two. They’re soooooo close. Fingers crossed.
There is going to be a lot of churn in both Juryo and Makuuchi after this basho. I look forward to hearing about everything that’s happening!
Thanks once again, to everyone at Tachiai for covering the basho and making sure we’re kept up to date on everything! Y’all are fantastic.
I thought Endo had a strong Aki, even stronger than his 9-6 finish would indicate, with some really solid wins. So I was looking for him to make some noise in Kyushu, only to be surprised and disappointed. He looked injured to me, particularly in the first week.
Thank you!
I hope Atamifuji finds a way to deal with the big moments. He was tentative and nervous yesterday and again today, with his odd initial move off the tachiai and subsequent poor body positioning which led to his defeat. It’s tough to see him lose two winnable yushos in a row.
Let’s remember that he just turned 21 and this was only his 3rd top division tournament.
If I were starting a heya, along with trying to use data and modern training methods, I would bring in sports psychologists. I feel Kisenosato and Takayasu would have won many yusho and Atamifuji seems so bashful at times, I wonder if he has a hard time accepting that he belongs in Sanyaku.
You could have said the same thing about his makuuchi debut. He seemed to learn OK from that. I suspect it’ll be the same here..
He’ll learn. He’s improved from his debut to now. Now he’s facing top guys on a regular basis and actually winning. When he lands in joi/sanyaku, he might do terribly but the next tournament, when he’s thrown back down into the rank-and-file, hopefully he will see how much better he is than they are.
Thanks for the daily coverage, Andy. It was Entertaining.
Thank you. Hopefully you are as excited about Hatsu 2024!
Sure am excited about Hatsu 2024, specially because of the high odds of Ura being in Sanyaku and there will be another Yokozuna and Ozeki runs next tournament.
Thank you to Team Tachiai for all the terrific reportage.
Ura started this basho 0-5, then won 8 of his last 10, including his last four in a row. Enjoy your time in sanyaku, fella!
Thank you!
Kotonowaka has been great at holding the Sekiwake position for a long time without the assistance of kadoban status that Ozeki receive. If he can reach Ozeki and stays healthy, he should hold that position for a long time.
Just found an interesting table on Sumo Japan. Five of the ten wrestlers with the deepest interim falls in rank since WW2 were on the Kyushu banzuke (Ura, Tomokaze, Terunofuji, Abi and Asanoyama). Coincidence or are there any other explanations?
I’m curious who the other five are.
Hope the link works:
https://www.sumo.or.jp/img/banzuketopic/table202311_1en.gif
Hopefully we will add Enho to this list one day. There could be a few reasons for it. Maybe surgery/treatment options have made it possible to recover from serious injuries. But also there may be lifestyle changes that we don’t know about. Maybe with the stricter anti-bullying efforts, top ranked guys don’t get harassed when they fall so they think retirement is no longer the only option? I don’t have any answers but it raises interesting questions.
And Abi and Asanoyama were suspended not injured. Maybe they would have been forced to retire in earlier days? (And there was no Corona before, of course.)
Excellent points. Forgot about those.
If I had to choose one factor I‘d take a combination of your two ideas: lifestyle changes/less harassment. Maybe it was once considered a shame for an ex-Makuuchi rikishi to fight in, say, Sandanme? I think that sounds quite plausible but may of course still be totally wrong.
ozeki certainly used to opt to retire out of a sense of honor (like Goeido did) rather than face demotion
Also, they were presumably wrapping up their careers. Terunofuji and Asanoyama were early in their careers and had aspirations to reach Ozeki again or even higher. In Terunofuji’s case, and maybe even Asanoyama, we have a guy who is favored to inherit the heya but not immediately. Goeido wasn’t going to be regaining his rank.
I’d say the main reason is simply that doing professional sumo has increasingly come to be seen as a “career”, not a “quest”. The previous tendency of ozeki to retire rather than take a demotion was already noted, but similar things also happened further down the rankings. Long-time top division men spending several twilight years in juryo used to be rather uncommon, and even more extreme, in the 1950s and 60s you can find bunches of guys who reached juryo for a short time and promptly retired when they fell back to makushita, often being only in their mid-20s. Basically, it was a “see how far you can go” mentality, not how long you can go.
Sekitori salaries increasing rather drastically over the decades (especially from the mid 1980s to early 2000s) probably played a role in that development, too.
There’s almost a 6th active makuuchi man on that list as Ryuden was down at Makushita 47 before he came back to the top division.
“My hypothesis is that the ‘Hakuho era’ was not just down to him. He had great rivalries with Harumafuji, Kisenosato, Kotoshogiku, Kakuryu…guys who faced him, and each other, over and over for more than a decade.”
Certainly agree with this
Whenever I watch Kintamayama’s digests and he throws in a bout from 2013 or whatever, I’m always stuck by the level that you see from an ozeki or a sekiwake that has been really hard to replicate these last few years
It feels possible at least that Kirishima/Hoshoryu/Kotonowaka will form the next reliable core for 5 years or so, and Onosato will probably zoom up the banzuke despite the fact he hasn’t even really looked that good yet
Thanks to the Tachiai team, Andy, Iksumo and everyone for your coverage of a very exciting basho and a very interesting year of Sumo (can’t forget about Bruce, respect to him). Kirishima and Daiesho finish the year 1 and 2 in total wins. Kirishima takes his 2nd basho, 1st as Ozeki, glad to see that big smile of his again with the cup in hand. Hoshoryu looks more comfortable with his champion ranking, Kotonowaka, Daiesho and Atamifuji all look like real Ozeki candidates themselves. Grand Sumo looks to be in a very good place, Terunofuji’s health notwithstanding, heading into 2024.
Plus, maybe just accidentally, the four yusho winners beyond the sekitori ranks add up to 79 years of age. I take that as a sign that there are more quality rikishi in the making.