dada78641

I propose that Sumo Forum makes a new award for each basho, called the Sent To Get Bento Award (or just the Bento Award?). Given out to the rikishi sent the furthest into the audience as a result of being shoved out. The first award should go to Ishiura after his trip today, I think. Unless someone remembers a better one. Tobizaru also got sent pretty far. Also, for purposes of posterity, the two players in this basho's big finale: And Takakeisho's second tournament victory:

Beautiful Enho-like sumo in Enho's match today. It's just unfortunate it came from Terutsuyoshi instead of Enho.

Really glad to see such good belt sumo from Hokutofuji, today and yesterday too.

RIP (retire in peace) to the human cannonball.

What a beast.

You can really think of both styles (connected and non-connected strokes) as equally "correct". It's kind of like serifs/sans serifs in Latin fonts. If you go to a Japanese language school where they'll mark your whole kanji as incorrect if you make just one tiny minuscule mistake somewhere, they'll none the less be perfectly fine with either style in your handwriting. Modern fonts mostly use the connected style. Just because Wikipedia shows one particular style doesn't mean that's necessarily the "correct" way or the only way. In handwriting people usually write them non-connected. In calligraphy (the font in that image mimics a particular calligraphy style), when using a thick brush, two strokes that are close together (like the two り strokes) tend to be connected more commonly. The き strokes are actually a bit further away from each other and the bottom left hook stroke is actually quite small. Sorry for this aside, now back to our regular programming...

The NHK showed a list of kimarite rankings: Obviously, no surprises as to which three made it to the top. Would be way more interesting to see a top 20. The big salt throw, seen from afar: Quite a lot of people in the audience this basho. They're still not allowed to do anything but clap, I guess, though. Tochinoshin vs Endo: "Hang on, I see someone on the front row who owes me money." He flew a pretty big distance: You can feel the guy he almost bumped into thinking "情けねぇ..."

Kotoshogiku was always right at the top of my list of wrestlers I'd like to meet. In everything I've ever seen of him he just seems like such a cool and laid back guy. There's some fun videos of him training online too: 琴奨菊関、お疲れ様でした！

RIP (retire in peace) to a real one.

More like bum shaking time (booty shaking time?) but yes, that's close enough

Ichinojo goes beast mode and beats Kaisei using shumoku-zori (bell hammer backwards body drop), which splits the dohyo clean in half the moment Kaisei's body touches down.

Yeah, I don't disagree with this at all. There's no perfect solution. There should really be a yokozuna there for the up-and-coming wrestlers to take shots at, and if you win a tournament without one on the banzuke people will always be saying "he might not have won it had a yokozuna been there", which is a bit of a downer. It's a shame, but I just think allowing them time off and not forcing them into tournaments where they're just going to perform poorly and possibly injure themselves further is the less bad solution in the long run.

Am I the only one who's just not bothered one bit by a yokozuna taking multiple basho off? Let them do it. I wish there was a better solution for wrestlers without the privilege of doing so since a lot are being forced into destroying their bodies and shortening their careers. The last three basho Kakuryu fought to a finish, he came in second twice and won once. He's still a true yokozuna if his body is in decent shape. If we can get some more good tournaments from him in exchange for him taking some time off, I say that's fine!

I just happened to be watching スーパーJ and suddenly there's Mainoumi/舞の海 promoting some kind of green vegetable juice.

We could probably have a whole separate thread about wrestlers who had injuries that their oyakata tried to "cure" by training or by appearing in tournaments as though nothing is wrong...

To be honest, I thought that about Endo in the past, but I don't think he's gonna start fading out just yet. For the longest time, his problem was that each time he got anywhere near the top of the maegashira, he'd bounce right back down. But since Haru 2019 he has been at M2 or higher. Of course, he's gonna go down a bit after his poor Aki performance but he's done well to remain stable at this rank for so long.

Here's two more photos I wanted to post, even though they're from day 14. This is Chiyonokuni focusing before his match to clinch the Juryo yusho: And here's the moment he did so: The reason why I like this photo is because they let Tanigawa-oyakata (former Hokutoriki, on the left) from Kokonoe sit ringside that day so he could see his stable's wrestler win the yusho.

Shodai receiving the Prime Minister's Cup:

No, he did that intentionally I think. He might've hurt his arm a little, so he did some stretching or something. It didn't at all look to me like he was physically unable to put any weight on it.

Good thing the ringside judges overturned that decision in Tochi vs Endo. I was afraid this was gonna be yet another poor decision against him, of which he's had a few in the past.

Very unusual henka/hatakikomi from Hokutofuji. I guess he was 3-7 and had enough of his usual Vigorous Sumo for a little while.

Ah, that makes sense. Thanks.

Not an update, but a question: I was looking at Takamisakari's page and noticed that in 2000.11 he went 0-0-15 but somehow did not drop in rank. He's ranked J2e twice in a row despite two consecutive kyujo. After that he became Ms1e. Maybe an update is needed here?

What a henka by Tochi. It's a shame we didn't get a real match between them, but I guess I can't blame him. He correctly gambled that it would work. Takakeisho should've been able to deal with it. Tochi now admitting in the interview that he thinks it's a little poor to use a technique like that, but oh well.

Shodai and Myogiryu both very nearly defeated themselves just now.