Goeido to Retire

[yorikiried by fate 2,029]

1 hour ago, RabidJohn said:

It's not revisionism, it's just credit where it's due, and all that.

The revisionism is to charcterize Ozeki who are alternating between MK and 8-7ish results as achieving anything beyond good networking skills. Have you actually seen ChiyotaKaio in their last couple of years?

I'm shocked to see that the rose-tinted glasses are back in fashion.

 

And concerning Goeido himself: I don't have any feelings toward him as a person whatsoever. Sumowise I rate him in the bracket of Tochiozan. Very talented, good basics but without the neccessary mental strength. That he was dragged kicking and screaming to the rank together with the other two goofs back in the days of The Big Japanese Yusho Drought was unfortunate for him, at least in respect to how I (and certainly a couple of other people) rate him. If he would have stayed a Wakanosato-like sanyaku mainstay (which would have been his proper place), I'd evaluate his career and achievements in sumo differently, more positively. As it was, I understood him just to be a prop that was screwed to the Ozeki slots of the banzuke.

[Tsuchinoninjin 1,276]

1 hour ago, yorikiried by fate said:

The revisionism is to charcterize Ozeki who are alternating between MK and 8-7ish results as achieving anything beyond good networking skills. Have you actually seen ChiyotaKaio in their last couple of years?

I'm shocked to see that the rose-tinted glasses are back in fashion.

 

And concerning Goeido himself: I don't have any feelings toward him as a person whatsoever. Sumowise I rate him in the bracket of Tochiozan. Very talented, good basics but without the neccessary mental strength. That he was dragged kicking and screaming to the rank together with the other two goofs back in the days of The Big Japanese Yusho Drought was unfortunate for him, at least in respect to how I (and certainly a couple of other people) rate him. If he would have stayed a Wakanosato-like sanyaku mainstay (which would have been his proper place), I'd evaluate his career and achievements in sumo differently, more positively. As it was, I understood him just to be a prop that was screwed to the Ozeki slots of the banzuke.

Good at networking?? The way Goeido talks to people? 

A boy from Osaka getting handouts from the Tokyo sumo league?

[Thorbjarn 215]

Are the other Ozeki of questionable quality (aka goofs) Kotoshogiku and Kisenosato? Like 24 Double digits as an Ozeki Kisenosato? 11 Jun Yusho Kisenosato Ozeki? 1 Yusho Ozeki Kisenosato? Sorry to be blunt, but I don't see how anyone can question Kisenosato as an Ozeki of legendary status worthy of the rank. 

[yorikiried by fate 2,029]

Oh, the profoundness of numbers! Dear me! I yield.

 

You guys DO realize that there even was an official bout fixing scandal in sumo (which implies a lot substrata)? You guys DO know, of course the curious win patterns of kadoban Ozeki? Something that led to the coinage of the acronym OBSC.

Or was that all before your time?

[just_some_guy 284]

24 minutes ago, yorikiried by fate said:

OBSC

I must be out of the loop on this one, can you enlighten me? Google seems to think it's one of various soccer clubs.

[Unkonoyama 105]

Ozeki back scratching club 

[Benihana 1,937]

Goeido: 33 basho as Ozeki, 7 double digit KK, 9 kadoban, 1 zensho-yusho, 2 jun-yusho

Kisenosato: 31 basho as Ozeki, 24 double digit KK, 1 kadoban, 1 yusho, 11 jun-yusho. The only kadoban was a 7-8 and was the result of the only day he missed before THE injury

I wish him best of luck as future shisho.

[Yamanashi 3,904]

58 minutes ago, Benihana said:

Kisenosato: 31 basho as Ozeki,

Gee, that's two less than Goeido.  Can anyone take a deep dive into the data and find out why his string of Ozeki bashos stopped?

[Thorbjarn 215]

9 hours ago, yorikiried by fate said:

Oh, the profoundness of numbers! Dear me! I yield.

 

You guys DO realize that there even was an official bout fixing scandal in sumo (which implies a lot substrata)? You guys DO know, of course the curious win patterns of kadoban Ozeki? Something that led to the coinage of the acronym OBSC.

Or was that all before your time?

The point is you're accusing people of revisionism while using it yourself. I'm not going to argue your opinion, it is yours. 

Also I'm aware of the bout fixing scandal. In every sport there is (and yeah, sumo is more than just a Sport) there have been match fixing allegations and actual Match fixing. Especially combat sports. I'm not naive enough to discount that, especially in combat sports. The concept of Match fixing in Sumo is not a 2011-thing from what I read about it, it might well have been around since it was a competition. 

My question is: when did Goeido, Kotoshogiku and Kisenosato get actually proven/found to be guilty of matchfixing? There is this concept of people being innocent until proven guilty not the other way around. Same goes with "OBSC", it may very well exist/have existed, but until now all we have is analysis of people watching sumo claiming it to exist.

If you believe Goeido and the other two guys to be paper-Ozeki and their statistics not being worth a dime, that's fine. You'll have your opinion thought out and it's not my goal to force my view upon you (not that I could). 

I will however show my interpretation of the facts and statistics out there aswell as you post yours on a public forum. If my relatively short time as an avid sumo fan discards all the merit of my POV in regards to this or other sumo-related topics to you, that's also fine, although I still see a value in sharing my trains of thought as long as I take my time to formulate them.

I will try and watch as much Sumo from the past with the limited time I have, and maybe it'll change my view, but up until now I haven't seen any Goeido-bouts that convinced me that the fix was in. 

[robnplunder 976]

Winning percentage by Ozeki (not counting fusen/kyujo losses) :

Kise - 71% !!!!!

Takayasu - 66%

Takakeisho - 62%

Goeido & Kotoshogiku - 57%

Terunofuji - 52% 

Tochinoshin - 44%

[Kishinoyama 596]

Their is no way that I believe Kotoshogiku and Kisenosato were involved in match fixing. Kotoshogiku beat Kisenosato a number of times when Kisenosato was in the yusho race. Kisenosato was close to Yokozuna promotion so many times and failed. If any  match fixing was being done then Kisenosato would have been promoted to Yokozuna the first time he had the opportunity.

As for Goeido, I do think that he was very fortunate to get promoted but I don't think he fixed any matches. 

[RabidJohn 1,855]

I'm aware of the yaocho scandal and the evidence pointing to a possible OBSC following that, but since I resumed watching sumo regularly during Aki 2015 I've seen no evidence of the latter at all. Quite the contrary in fact, starting with Terunofuji's infamous henka that denied Kotoshogiku his sekiwake dog's chance. I did not see Goeido given any mercy when he was kadoban.

That said, I have seen matches that looked fixed to me, but they are very infrequent and don't appear to have anything to do with either yaocho or OBSC. The 2 occasions I'm thinking of looked more like the NSK trying to create a narrative when they spotted an opportunity; i.e. instructing a rikishi to lose for the sake of the show. Twice in 4 and a bit years I can live with, especially as the vast majority of the time they seem willing to let the dice fall as they may. 

[Benevolance 2,511]

The biggest failing of the OBSC is that they ran out of uninjured ozekis who could scratch backs. 

[sekitori 492]

 

Ozekis may have lost on purpose to help other ozekis maintain their rank, but at least their efforts seemed legitimate. 

The one bout that I'm absolutely convinced was thrown was the one before the day Kotshogiku won his only yusho--and I can understand the reason why. There had been no Japanese yusho winner in ten years. During the basho, Kotoshogiku defeated all three yokozunas--Kakuryu, Harmuaffui, and Hakuho. That seemed strange but at least those victories, although extremely unlikely,  seemed somewhat plausible. I had a feeling (and still do) that the yokozunas agreed that it was time for a Japanese rikishi to win a yusho and that one or all three of them agreed to let that happen. 

On day 13, Hakuho and Kotoshogiku were tied for the lead with one loss each. Kotoshogiku won his bout that day and then it was Hakuho's turn. He faced Kisenosato and needed a victory to continue to stay tied for the lead on senshuraku. I'm certain that Hakuho, if he cared to, was skilled enough to perform a believeable yaocho. Instead, he came up with possibly his worst effort ever. At the tachi-ai, he stood erect and allowed Kisenosato to easily push him out of the ring. The only "resistance" he provided was to gentlly put the palm of his left hand against the side of Kisenosato's face.. That meant that to win the yusho, all Kotoshogiku had to do was win his match on the following day-which he did.  Interestingly, to keep this post on topic, his opponent on that final day was Goeido. As strongly as I believe that the yokozunas allowed a Japanese rikishi to finally win, I also think that Kotoshogiku knew absolutely nothing about this .

Watch the Hakuho-Kisenosato bout.  It starts at about the 4 minute, 15 second mark. It was the most "un-Hakuho-like" sumo I ever saw and you  can see why I honestly believe that he intentionally threw it. What bothers me even more is that he did an extremely bad job of doing so. Someone with his enormous talent not only can do great sumo but he also should be able, if he wants to, to make poor sumo look reasonably believeable. In this instance, for some reason, he didn't. It could be that he wanted people to know that he actually was giving up his chance to win a yusho so that a Japanese rikishi could. I just wish he could have done it a lot better.

 

 

Edited February 1, 2020 by sekitori

[Thorbjarn 215]

Maybe it's case of: "The bigger the lie, The harder it is to detect...", but if this was a fight thrown on purpose, the job was so poorly done, especially with the fresh Match fixing scandal not too far removed. I won't say it is a thrown fight, but I won't say I know this to be 100% legitimate contest. 

That being said, no matter how good you are, mistakes do happen, better athletes loose to lesser ones even in sports which are decided over way longer durations, due to Individual mistakes. A sumo bout tends to be over within seconds, a moment of doubt can easily be enough to break your rhythm and cost you the Match. It doesn't happen often to Hakuho, but this doesn't mean it can never happen to him. 

[Kaninoyama 1,818]

22 minutes ago, Thorbjarn said:

Maybe it's case of: "The bigger the lie, The harder it is to detect...", but if this was a fight thrown on purpose, the job was so poorly done, especially with the fresh Match fixing scandal not too far removed. I won't say it is a thrown fight, but I won't say I know this to be 100% legitimate contest. 

That being said, no matter how good you are, mistakes do happen, better athletes loose to lesser ones even in sports which are decided over way longer durations, due to Individual mistakes. A sumo bout tends to be over within seconds, a moment of doubt can easily be enough to break your rhythm and cost you the Match. It doesn't happen often to Hakuho, but this doesn't mean it can never happen to him. 

Agree. It happens rarely, but occasionally Hakuho will blow a tachiai and concede defeat without resistance. 

If there was some secret plot to finally grant a Japanese rikishi a doctored yusho, I suspect it would not have taken 10 full years to enact it.

[sekitori 492]

2 hours ago, Kaninoyama said:

 

If there was some secret plot to finally grant a Japanese rikishi a doctored yusho, I suspect it would not have taken 10 full years to enact it.

There is a good reason for not bringing up this situation again. People refuse to believe that a yokozuna (or yokozunas) would ever try to lose a bout so that the first Japanese rikishi in ten years would finally win a yusho. However, I think that at least Hakuho wanted to do what would be the best for sumo. Another yusho by a Mongolian yokozuna , especially Hakuho, would have meant very little to Japanese sumo fans--and also to those who didn't really care about sumo. But Kotoshogiku's victory made a nation who desperately wanted a championship  by one of their own in a sport of Japanese origin extremely proud. In other words, Kotoshogiku's yusho was not just good for sumo--it was wonderfiul. I think that Hakuho and possibly the other two yokozunas , as that fact became more possible, wanted it to happen. I'm also certain that because there is no other proof of match throwing other than Hakuho's extremely unusual total lack of effort, no one will never admit that fact. In his bout against Kisenosato, Hakuho did not make a mistake. In my opinion,  he accomplished exactly what he wanted to--but he did it very badly.

I think that the idea of conspiracies and secret plots are kind of ridiculous ---but I strongly believe in this one. The facts make too much sense not to.

Edited February 2, 2020 by sekitori

[robnplunder 976]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

15

4 hours ago, sekitori said:

15

4 hours ago, sekitori said:

 

Ozekis may have lost on purpose to help other ozekis maintain their rank, but at least their efforts seemed legitimate. 

The one bout that I'm absolutely convinced was thrown was the one before the day Kotshogiku won his only yusho--and I can understand the reason why. There had been no Japanese yusho winner in ten years. During the basho, Kotoshogiku defeated all three yokozunas--Kakuryu, Harmuaffui, and Hakuho. That seemed strange but at least those victories, although extremely unlikely,  seemed somewhat plausible. I had a feeling (and still do) that the yokozunas agreed that it was time for a Japanese rikishi to win a yusho and that one or all three of them agreed to let that happen. 

On day 13, Hakuho and Kotoshogiku were tied for the lead with one loss each. Kotoshogiku won his bout that day and then it was Hakuho's turn. He faced Kisenosato and needed a victory to continue to stay tied for the lead on senshuraku. I'm certain that Hakuho, if he cared to, was skilled enough to perform a believeable yaocho. Instead, he came up with possibly his worst effort ever. At the tachi-ai, he stood erect and allowed Kisenosato to easily push him out of the ring. The only "resistance" he provided was to gentlly put the palm of his left hand against the side of Kisenosato's face.. That meant that to win the yusho, all Kotoshogiku had to do was win his match on the following day-which he did.  Interestingly, to keep this post on topic, his opponent on that final day was Goeido. As strongly as I believe that the yokozunas allowed a Japanese rikishi to finally win, I also think that Kotoshogiku knew absolutely nothing about this .

Watch the Hakuho-Kisenosato bout.  It starts at about the 4 minute, 15 second mark. It was the most "un-Hakuho-like" sumo I ever saw and you  can see why I honestly believe that he intentionally threw it. What bothers me even more is that he did an extremely bad job of doing so. Someone with his enormous talent not only can do great sumo but he also should be able, if he wants to, to make poor sumo look reasonably believeable. In this instance, for some reason, he didn't. It could be that he wanted people to know that he actually was giving up his chance to win a yusho so that a Japanese rikishi could. I just wish he could have done it a lot better

I don't know if anyone is losing on purpose but there were many instances that I suspected lack of "honest" effort by a rikishi to help his opponent.   There were too many to mention.   And if were to mention them each time I suspected it, most folks in this forum would have disagreed.   The aforementioned Hak against Kotoshogiku match was one I had my suspicion.   Then there were a few Mongolian vs Mongolian matches which I suspect less than an honest effort by a rikishi.   The efforts are not obvious but more often than not, the one who needed the win got the win.   Then again, it may be just me.   

Edited February 2, 2020 by robnplunder

[Thorbjarn 215]

I always have the feeling the Mongolians who are good at Yotsu, especially the Yokozuna, are willing to go chest to chest and not go all out in regards to resisting/trying to get last minute desperation throws at the tawara.

I can understand the sentiment of considering this for an dishonest effort, but to me it seems to be more of a Gentlemen's agreement. Like when football (soccer) teams kick the Ball over the sideline when a player goes down with an injury or people in the early days of MMA not using punches to the groin or hairpulls despite those being allowed back then. 

If the idea / concept of dishonesty in Sumo is that you always approach every match in a way that yields the best (Match) result for you as an Rikishi, there are probably multiple dishonest efforts at least every Basho. Goeido would be to blame aswell, because with seven losses on the clock he decided not to go for what worked best for him during the last few years (aka bullrush pushouts), but went to a belt battle with Asanoyama, who is really good and had youth, strength and fitness on his side. 

To me it seemed as if Goeido decided against a more promising approach (regarding chances of winning) in favour of showing up and fighting a good fight. Hakuho (maybe) gifting Kotoshogiku a Yusho after a ten-year-wait is of course not in the same vein.

But again, there is also a head game in sumo, like in every other sport. As soon as the mere thought of "well, maybe it's not bad if a Japanese wins this! And that Kotoshogiku dude is a nice guy... " enters the head, even if you decide to not throw the game, you will very likely not get into the right mode. It looks really iffy, but there is also the possibility of a big mistake accompanied by arguably the greatest of all time not getting his head into the game. I can definetly see a foundation for the points of @sekitori and @robnplunder

[ALAKTORN 346]

On 31/01/2020 at 19:12, yorikiried by fate said:

You guys DO know, of course the curious win patterns of kadoban Ozeki? Something that led to the coinage of the acronym OBSC.

Or was that all before your time?

It indeed was before the time of some members. OBSC is old news. This happened when Kotoōshū and Kakuryū were still ōzeki. The new guard doesn’t care to do it.

[Gospodin 219]

On 01/02/2020 at 23:11, sekitori said:

 

Ozekis may have lost on purpose to help other ozekis maintain their rank, but at least their efforts seemed legitimate. 

Baruto wasn´t particularly good at disguising his dives. That one would have made Neymar proud (and no, I don´t believe everything is fixed. But a look at probabilities alone shows that rikishi are indeed trading favors). 

 

Edited February 5, 2020 by Gospodin

[Kuroyama 715]

On 03/02/2020 at 09:58, ALAKTORN said:

It indeed was before the time of some members. OBSC is old news. This happened when Kotoōshū and Kakuryū were still ōzeki. The new guard doesn’t care to do it.

I was also noticing there seemed to be much less back-scratching going on.

I don't know if it's that they don't care to do it so much that the current ozeki seem much more vulnerable to injury. Kaio or Kotooshu or Chiyotaikai might have been able to avoid kadoban or demotion with a favor or two, but for the most part the new guard's losing records come with a pretty serious collapse, and a favor or two from a fellow ozeki won't save them anymore. Looking over the past year or two, the only time it might have helped was Tochinoshin's 7-8 score in Osaka last year, when one win would have saved him his rank, and both Takayasu and Goeido could have well afforded to give it to him. In all other cases it would have been either futile, or other ozeki couldn't spare the loss.

Edited February 6, 2020 by Kuroyama

[Otokonoyama 2,735]

Retrospective: Ozeki Goeido - GRAND SUMO

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwcL9LF4wp0

[CT3* 331]

On 01/02/2020 at 21:55, sekitori said:

There is a good reason for not bringing up this situation again. People refuse to believe that a yokozuna (or yokozunas) would ever try to lose a bout so that the first Japanese rikishi in ten years would finally win a yusho. However, I think that at least Hakuho wanted to do what would be the best for sumo. Another yusho by a Mongolian yokozuna , especially Hakuho, would have meant very little to Japanese sumo fans--and also to those who didn't really care about sumo. But Kotoshogiku's victory made a nation who desperately wanted a championship  by one of their own in a sport of Japanese origin extremely proud. In other words, Kotoshogiku's yusho was not just good for sumo--it was wonderfiul. I think that Hakuho and possibly the other two yokozunas , as that fact became more possible, wanted it to happen. I'm also certain that because there is no other proof of match throwing other than Hakuho's extremely unusual total lack of effort, no one will never admit that fact. In his bout against Kisenosato, Hakuho did not make a mistake. In my opinion,  he accomplished exactly what he wanted to--but he did it very badly.

I think that the idea of conspiracies and secret plots are kind of ridiculous ---but I strongly believe in this one. The facts make too much sense not to.

Kotoshogiku's yusho was a gift, imo. Seemed fairly obvious at the time.

[Asashosakari 19,661]

13 hours ago, Kuroyama said:

I was also noticing there seemed to be much less back-scratching going on.

I don't know if it's that they don't care to do it so much that the current ozeki seem much more vulnerable to injury.

In the yaocho scandal days, what I saw said by Japanese fans included many comments that the shisho of both the old Naruto-beya (i.e. Kisenosato's stable) and Sakaigawa-beya (Goeido's) were known inside the sumo world as hardcore anti-yaocho. (It seemed to get said with an undertone of "they're some of the few who are".) This was of course before either Kisenosato or Goeido were ozeki themselves, so this wasn't some kind of PR effort to protect those guys' reputations. It could simply be that there's been no more OBSC during the current era because there was an insufficient number of willing participants.

(Not that that's going to persuade anyone who is unable to watch sumo through anything but the yaocho lens... Or maybe it's just nostalgia for former glory days when that viewpoint hadn't descended into self-parody yet.)

Edited February 6, 2020 by Asashosakari