Apologies for the lack of a banzuke preview post. Predicting this one proved extremely challenging, and by the time I got my thoughts organized, the Guess The Banzuke deadline was upon us. Due to the holidays, the banzuke comes out a week earlier than usual, on December 22, three weeks prior to the start of the January tournament. Here is my official prediction. I won’t go through the rationale; suffice it to say, I am confident in only about one-third of the placements, and at least a dozen decisions I made could easily go the other way. Other than the Yokozuna and Ozeki, Churanoumi at M5w seems like just about the only certainty; now watch the banzuke committee put someone else there. Look forward to everyone’s thoughts in the comments.
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Be interesting to see how Asanoyama does back under the big spotlight…
I do hope that your guess is good because then mine wouldn’t be that bad.
From the top to M9e I had Wakamotoharu make place for Ichiyamamoto and Atamifuji for Tamawashi. From the bottom to M13e I swapped places between Asakoryu and Asanoyama.
Only between these two ranks there is a bit of a mess, which can still cost me a lot of ranks at GTB, of course. But for now I‘m quite contented.
I have some confidence in WMH ahead of Ichi, but the other two swaps were both really close calls for me. Rearranging Atami, Tamawashi, and Daieisho in pretty much any order wouldn’t surprise me.
As I like Ichiyamamoto a lot and Wakamotoharu not, I opted for the maths, stubbornly ignoring that my favorite fought only from M8.
What gives me hope is that one could see their day 15 bout as decisive.
What a disappointment! Though I had so many positions exactly like U and though U are in the top ten (congrats), I‘m not even in the top 200. U were right with Ichiyamamoto, unfortunately (for him and me) and with Asanoyama, but still I expected a little bit more.
One little thing that hasn’t helped my cause: I forgot to swap the two yokozuna…
Yes the world falls apart after M5!
Most red color in a model banzuke I ever remember in my short experience so far!
Reading Asanoyama‘s name in Makuuchi again is such a joy, after following his great efforts since Osaka basho this year. 7-0, 6-1, 5-2, 12-3, 12-3! Couldn’t do much better with still a creaky knee…
Do U mean the red in Iksumo‘s guess? It may seem like a lot of red because it’s concentrated on the west side. But all in all I counted 19 and last time there were 21 of them. That’s not surprising if U consider that even holding the position in maegashira results in red!
?? The red is just losing record, at least on the picture I see?
Yes, much losing records, I meant. Just waiting for someone to get the statistics :)
20 maegashira had losing records, not out of the ordinary, it’s been between 16 and 23 since 2020.
Thank you, and good luck for your GTB result!
3 yokozunas on the top picture. hmm
Yeah, our image library is a bit out of date
As this is the crystal ball maybe it shows the May banzuke!
Abi yusho incoming!
In Fantasy Sumo?
Dear God no.
I’m going to rename GTB to “Where’s Gonoyama” since I never get him in the right place. Let’s see what happens this time.
Ok, January’s up. Who hit the nail on the head?
I did 😎
Well done Iksumo. It’s always impressive how close you are to the committee’s collective thinking. The biggest surprise is the placement of this Hakunofuji guy? He came out of nowhere to get the M3 West spot! Just kidding, it’s the artist formerly known Ochiai and Hakuoho, who now has a proper Isegahama shikona replete with a Fuji character and everything. Pretty interesting development in its own right. Well, just a couple of weeks and the 2026 Grand Sumo year will commence. I hope it’s as good as 2025 was.
There are a lot of shikona changes in Isegahama.
It seems that only Enho was allowed to keep the -ho instead of -fuji.
Can anyone explain Shodai’s placement? I cannot figure it out.
“Where’s Gonoyama” didn’t work out again, huh? ;)
Well, exactly the same as Oshoma’s placement and pretty similar to Hiradoumi, too. I guess they decided on under-demotion over over-promotion for that nasty little band in the middle.
Under-demotion over over-promotion seems like a reasonable strategy when you put it that way.
they just treated all the 4-11 guys at M3, M4, and M5 the same, even though the cases of the alternative candidates were different in each case
Onosato will be kyujo – my prediction.
Hope U didn’t bet on it. Fortunately it seems that U were wrong.