Who said that winning anything would be easy in this tournament? Well, it sure looked like it for about two weeks in the bottom division. A win for Takahashi here would have clinched the Jonokuchi division yusho. Kazuto would not go quietly into that good night. After the tachiai, Kazuto buried the crown of his head into Takahashi’s chin. This disrupts Takahashi’s game plan, lifting his upper body.
Kazuto tried to get some forward momentum going but when Plan A failed, he moved to Plan B and tried a quick slap-down… but missed. Plan C? RUN! Kazuto backed away, cycling around the dohyo with Takahashi in hot pursuit. Seeing no options, Kazuto planted at the tawara and made a last ditch effort, collecting it all to launch forward into Takahashi. What do you know, it worked! He corralled Takahashi squarely and drove through the dohyo, sending Takahashi to his first loss. This win sealed a ticket for a rematch in a prime time yusho playoff on senshuraku.
The Jonidan yusho was claimed by Hitoshi. That’s his second yusho in Jonidan. He won last year but after several tournaments kyujo, re-entered Jonokuchi last tournament. He featured in the opening days of the yusho race in May before losing to Yamato and Kazekeno, both of whom eventually fought in that play-off, Kazekeno claiming the title.
Speaking of Kazekeno, he finished with a strong sixth win. His only loss was to Miyagino prospect Ishii. This is another strong group of competitors who will find themselves in Sandanme in September. Unfortunately, Yamato won’t be able to join them yet because he got caught up in Musashigawa’s covid kyujo earlier in the tournament, and will finish with a 2-2-3 make-koshi including a loss to veteran Tochihayate. It will be very interesting to see where he ends up on that banzuke.
In the end, the Jonokuchi title came down to one bout: undefeated Inoue against Tsukubayama, a Jonidan-ranked wrestler with one-loss. I was a bit puzzled by the pairing, frankly. Inoue had faced both Chiyoshishi and Goseiryu on his path to the yusho, so I had assumed he would face Raiho. Instead, Inoue faced Tsukubayama, a young man from…you guessed it…Tsukuba city in Ibaraki prefecture. He’s another young’un who started his sumo career last summer and has remained in Jonidan but at Jonidan 91, even a 6th win would likely not be enough to secure a promotion to Sandanme.
Inoue pressed forward and defeated Tsukubayama, without breaking a sweat. Tsukabayama half-heartedly tried a henka, shifting to his right at the tachiai. Inoue’s coming off an injury, so he’s not going to be charging headlong into the crowd. Inoue just pivoted left and bulled forward, shoving Tsukubayama out. Congratulations, Inoue, on the yusho!
Chiyoshishi tossed Takabaho for a dominant ouchie-ta-ouchie win. And lastly, Raiho defeated Goseiryu. Raiho latched on quickly to Goseiryu’s belt with his left-hand, and then came down hard with his right, throwing Goseiryu to the ground.
Jonidan
The Jonidan yusho race came down to three wrestlers with 6 wins; Chiyoyamato, Yurikisho, and Kaiho. Higher-ranked Kaiho was paired against Sandanme yusho contender, Taiyo. Chiyoyamato faced Yurikisho in the bout from the tweet below.
With Yurikisho’s victory assured, he still had to wait for the Kaiho bout to know whether he won outright or would need to fight in a playoff. Kaiho won, meaning there would be a Jonidan playoff.
Sandanme
In Sandanme, the Kaiho victory meant Taiyo was out of the race and the winner would be one of two men. You’ll remember Arauma as the Jonokuchi yusho contender from January, who beat Atamifuji on their first meeting but then lost in their playoff rematch. This tournament, he faced the Kinbozan, who debuts in sandanme because of his success at the university level. Kinbozan was 10cm taller, and 30kg heavier and used all of that mass to overpower Arauma. Atamifuji awaits both, as they will be promoted to Makushita but Atamifuji is already nearing the precipice to Juryo.
Makushita
Ryuden won the Makushita yusho with straight-forward oshi-zumo against former Juryo wrestler, Chiyonoumi. This victory marks his return to action after serving a suspension. Along the way he did face several former sekitori, including Chiyonoumi, so his path to yusho was not easy.
He will need to do it again in January for promotion to Juryo, but that will be even more difficult with many wrestlers, including Atamifuji, fighting for the few slots which open up.
Juryo
Lastly, Ichiyamamoto claimed the Juryo yusho with an impressive 13-2 record. He’s virtually assured a slot in Makuuchi with Hakuho’s retirement, Asanoyama’s suspension, Shohozan’s demotion, and possible demotions for Kaisei and Kagayaki.
I couldn’t get all of the bouts into the video, so I supplemented with some of these clips from YouTube. I did manage to get the yusho ceremony so that’s tacked onto the end of the video at the top.
Some sail to Juryo on a barge from Makuuchi, for others, it’s a luxury cruise
The Japan Sumo Association has set up its banzuke for November and determined there will be three wrestlers promoted to Juryo from Makushita. One wrestler, Kotokuzan, returns to the salaried ranks. His debut in July yielded four wins but eleven losses and quick demotion back to Makushita. Four wins this tournament were all he needed to go back up, indicating that the 3-rank fall may have been a bit soft. Prior instances of 4-11 records from near the bottom rung of the Juryo ladder resulted in drops to the fifth or sixth rank in Makushita* (corrected). From that rank, even Shiba’s 5-2 was insufficient for promotion. I expect him to be at the bottom of Juryo this time with a short leash, meaning that another four-win performance in Kyushu should result in a more significant drop.
The other two wrestlers will be donning kesho mawashi for the first time as professional wrestlers, Asanowaka and Hiradoumi. Asanowaka is the new shikona for Terasawa, who had been competing under his family name until this promotion. Asanowaka seems to have requested the shikona from current Takasago coach Wakamatsu, as back during his fighting days Wakamatsu never had any kyujo, or absences, throughout his career. If that name change helps him stay healthy, succeed, and remain in the paid ranks for at least a few more tournaments, he may well become heyagashira in 2022 as his former senpai, Asanoyama, tumbles into Makushita.
Tachiai readers may remember a feature article on mawashi written by Herouth, inspired by the unsolved mystery of Terasawa’s pilfered cloth, which happened to be imbued with mystical powers from the remains of his late pet rabbit. That article is always worth a read, not just for the bizarre who-done-it, but the wealth of information about practice mawashi and competition mawashi in both amateur and Grand Sumo. There’s a discussion of sagari as well as the difference between the silk shimekomi (which Asanowaka will now wear with stiffened sagari), and the cotton mawashi.
What are you still doing here? Go. Read it. Now. I’ll wait.
Welcome back. Fascinating read, no? Hopefully that answered some of the questions you had and likely pointed out some things you never even noticed.
Hiradoumi also joins Asanowaka in Juryo. It’s quite the basho for Sakaigawa beya as Sadanoumi’s 10-wins will lift him back into Makuuchi and Myogiryu’s jun-yusho performance was also rewarded with a special prize. However, both of these veterans are in the latter stages of their careers while Hiradoumi, at 21 years old, is still trying to establish himself. This was his fifth consecutive kachi-koshi record, making a rather determined slog through the grist mill at the top of the third division. Congratulations to all three!
The Intrigue
Not so fast, there Andy, I’ve got another question.
So, does this mean there were supposed to be two promotions and with Hakuho’s retirement Kotokuzan gets the “free pass,” and joins the pack on the lead lap? (I’ll find out who’s here for NASCAR references.) Or does this mean that Hakuho’s announcement was still not done in time for the banzuke committee to remove his name from the banzuke? I think it would be very odd for Hakuho to still appear on the list in Kyushu since he announced his retirement before the banzuke committee drew up their list. So Kyokushuho might still make the cut due to the lack of other promotion candidates among the top makushita ranks. If Shiba had a 6-1 record or a yusho, would he have joined the other three and taken Kyokushuho’s slot? Or will Kyokushuho drop, essentially for nothing?
Given the weak demotion given to Kotokuzan after his 4-11 record in July, I find it hard to demote Kyokushuho from a rank and a half higher on a 6-9 record. We know that 7-8 is often good enough to maintain ones rank and Kyokushuho has already had a couple of recent instances of two-rank drops with 6-9 records. Why not drop him to Juryo-jiri and only demote Takakento after his 3-12 and Asashiyu after his 1-14? This avoids the difficult choice of trying to decide who is the next deserving candidate from Makushita when it’s hard to justify Jokoryu at Ms4 with a 4-3, Shiba at Ms6 with a 5-2, or Tsushimanada at Ms9 with 6-1.
Anyway, my banzuke for Kyushu has Hakuho off and Kyokushuho sitting on the bottom rung of Juryo.
The Addendum
Not so fast, again, Andy! As Leonid rightly points out below, Takagenji’s gone. That’s what you get for removing the Scandal Meter. While his slot was conspicuously vacant in the last tournament, it will certainly be filled this time around. So that means two promotions were “extra” this time around? Will Takakento be saved? No. I think that’s the point that puts Hakuho back on the banzuke. My point above that the Kyokai would have to “go fishing” for a lackluster promotion candidate is only half the story. They need to find two promotion candidates from that field. Kyokushuho was never in danger of demotion.
So let’s turn back to those promotion candidates. A promotion from Ms6 with 5 wins is rare but has happened three times this century, to Baruto and Satoyama. Baruto proceeded to a very successful 12-3 record in that debut tournament, while Satoyama’s makekoshi 7-8 was still safe because he had been promoted to Juryo 12E from Ms6. His case was a highly unusual one, though, as he was one of nine promotions that tournament. The yaocho scandal had claimed many scalps that year. The Ms9 promotion with 6 wins is even more rare, last granted…let’s see here…to some up-and-comer named Hakuho in 2003. There are certainly more promotions from Ms4 with 4 wins, with Akiseyama’s promotion last year being the most recent example.
Without a fourth promotion, Hakuho is on the banzuke and someone’s getting robbed of a position in Juryo, and the victim appears to be Jokoryu.
The Japanese Sumo Association has announced that four Makushita wrestlers are being promoted to Juryo for July’s tournament. Kotokuzan from Arashio-beya (apparently NOT from Sadogatake-beya) will make his Juryo debut. Yago, Kaisho, and Abi return to the salaried ranks.
The headline here is that Abi, and his shiko?, will return to Sekitori status after serving a suspension for breaking Covid protocols with Fukushima (then Gokushindo). He has stormed back in the most rapid fashion, scoring 14 straight regulation victories, including a victory over Kaisho. While Abi was away, Ichiyamamoto returned and has established himself as a solid Juryo rikishi with a very successful Natsu. I am eager to see if the two of them go toe-to-toe at some point.
Abi’s redemption comes at an awkward time as current Ozeki Asanoyama is facing down a similar scandal, though the facts in his case are still being investigated and thus a punishment has yet to be determined.
Yago will be eager to finally find a permanent foothold in the division. He is talented but has struggled with injuries, seemingly yo-yoing between Juryo and Makushita. Kaisho reached Juryo briefly in 2019 for two tournaments before falling back into Makushita. For Kotokuzan, his promotion has been a long struggle. He has been in Makushita since the end of 2016, back when Terunofuji was an Ozeki the first time ’round. It will be interesting to see if he’s got a spark in his sumo that can keep him around for a while.
