Hatsu 2025 discussion (results)

[hakutorizakura 629]

It's Japanese habit: effort matters (in some cases more than the result).

It's seen better to stay at work until 10pm doing nothing even if you have finished everything by 5pm, rather than leaving immediately at 5. Or attending a lecture you've zero interest in and fall asleep there, rather than skipping it altogether. Some examples.

[Jakusotsu 5,969]

3 hours ago, Reonito said:

It's also a committee, so the individual members may well have been swayed by different arguments.

Exactly this. And don't expect the ever-changing members to analyze the historic numbers as deeply as "we" do.

[Yamanashi 3,844]

57 minutes ago, Jakusotsu said:

Exactly this. And don't expect the ever-changing members to analyze the historic numbers as deeply as "we" do.

Do you think it might help if eligibility for the YDC included having placed high up in GTB at least twice?

[Bunbukuchagama 724]

8 minutes ago, Yamanashi said:

Do you think it might help if eligibility for the YDC included having placed high up in GTB at least twice?

Yusho winners only! 

[Ryoshishokunin 288]

33 minutes ago, Bunbukuchagama said:

Yusho winners only! 

But do you also have a Yusho in grumbling about hinkaku?

[Leoben 141]

1 hour ago, Jakusotsu said:

Exactly this. And don't expect the ever-changing members to analyze the historic numbers as deeply as "we" do.

I wonder what they would think if they saw some of the discussions a bunch of graceless foreigners have on here.

[Koorifuu 1,001]

7 hours ago, Leoben said:

I wonder what they would think if they saw some of the discussions a bunch of graceless foreigners have on here.

Probably something along the lines of "Let's slam copyright claims on all their videos."

[Reonito 1,458]

10 hours ago, Bunbukuchagama said:

But winning 12 without a playoff (which is supposed to look better than a playoff 12-3) would somehow look less impressive?

Why is that supposed to look better? A 12-3 playoff loss is less impressive than a yusho, but a 12-3 playoff win doesn't come with an asterisk. Hoshoryu beat all the yusho contenders in regulation. The fact that two of them didn't lose to too many other people either says nothing about his performance or makes the fact that he beat them twice all the more impressive.

[Bunbukuchagama 724]

11 hours ago, Ryoshishokunin said:

But do you also have a Yusho in grumbling about hinkaku?

[Bunbukuchagama 724]

3 hours ago, Reonito said:

Why is that supposed to look better?

"I was barely better than the competition" vs "I was clearly better than the competition".

[Reonito 1,458]

1 hour ago, Bunbukuchagama said:

"I was barely better than the competition" vs "I was clearly better than the competition".

I dunno, if someone won the Olympic 100 m in 9.8, does it matter if the silver medalist ran 9.82 or 9.9?

[Bunbukuchagama 724]

1 minute ago, Reonito said:

I dunno, if someone won the Olympic 100 m in 9.8, does it matter if the silver medalist ran 9.82 or 9.9?

But it's more like 3 people finished in 9.8, and instead of awarding 3 gold medals, they made them run again. In most fields (not just sports) extra playoffs are not held.

[Sumo Spiffy 560]

5 hours ago, Koorifuu said:

Probably something along the lines of "Let's slam copyright claims on all their videos."

SHH SHH SPEAK NOT THESE IDEAS ALOUD

[Sumo Spiffy 560]

15 hours ago, Bunbukuchagama said:

But winning 12 without a playoff (which is supposed to look better than a playoff 12-3)

I don't think this would ever be true. Especially at the twelve-win level, if you don't need a playoff, that's good fortune more than anything. The question is if a twelve-win yusho with a playoff should look better than without a playoff. I'd have said no before, and maybe it was just a marginal consideration in this case, but the playoff did seem to matter at least a little here.

I guess, as long as a 13-2 straight up yusho always looks better than a 12-3 playoff win, that maintains a logical enough line of thought.

[Bunbukuchagama 724]

9 minutes ago, Sumo Spiffy said:

I don't think this would ever be true. Especially at the twelve-win level, if you don't need a playoff, that's good fortune more than anything. The question is if a twelve-win yusho with a playoff should look better than without a playoff. I'd have said no before, and maybe it was just a marginal consideration in this case, but the playoff did seem to matter at least a little here.

Well, when Keisho won his infamous 11-4 yusho, a lot of people (myself included) liked to emphasize that it was a "playoff henka against a teenager 21-year old 11-4 yusho" instead of just "11-4 yusho" when they wanted to call it a superweak yusho. 

But now, a "playoff against two Maegashira 12-3 yusho" is suddenly praised as the pinnacle of human achievement. 

Edited January 29 by Bunbukuchagama

[Reonito 1,458]

2 hours ago, Bunbukuchagama said:

Well, when Keisho won his infamous 11-4 yusho, a lot of people (myself included) liked to emphasize that it was a "playoff henka against a teenager 21-year old 11-4 yusho" instead of just "11-4 yusho" when they wanted to call it a superweak yusho. 

But now, a "playoff against two Maegashira 12-3 yusho" is suddenly praised as the pinnacle of human achievement. 

12 > 11, no henka, he beat two guys in great form—it's far from the pinnacle of sumo, which is why we're having the conversation, but I don't see them giving him the nod in the Keisho scenario. This one was just barely enough, and two strong playoff wins likely helped.

[Atenzan 1,081]

On 27/01/2025 at 21:18, Kamitsuumi said:

横綱審議委員会は内規で大関で2場所連続優勝した力士を横綱に推薦することを原則とし、これに準ずる成績をあげた力士を横綱に推薦する場合は、出席した委員の3分の2以上の決議が必要と定めています。

Very late to the party, but the most enlightening thing about this is the complete lack of mention of a *one-yusho* "equivalent". To be honest, when I was first getting into sumo in 2014-15ish, I came across an ancient text written in Babylonian cuneiform (or a post on the sumo mailing list archives, either one) that described a "yusho equivalent" as:

-Y with 12+ wins

-D with 13+ wins

-Any form of 14+ wins, even a 14-1J

And the prophecy went, should an ozeki string two basho of the above in a row, he shall be made yokozuna, amen. I took this to be way more of a hard and fast rule than it was. Post-Futahaguro and up to that point in time, I think this was a fairly accurate rule of thumb anyway, but I wish I had read what Kamitsuumi posted instead.

But the phrasing "2-basho renzoku yusho-shita [...] kore ni junzuru seiseki" paints a different picture entirely, and one that can be naturally relaxed to enable easier promotion when there's no yokozuna or at least a gaggle of exceptionally strong ozeki without seeming like a cop-out. From 2008 to 2014 inclusive, the average wins for a yusho was higher than it is now, and the yusho winner achieved less than a 13-2 only once, in the exceptionally strange for its time Kyokutenhou yusho. So, a YDC in those days could argue that a 13J-12Y wasn't really something that, if replicated, would consistently produce 2 yushos- it wouldn't be seiseki (results) that junzuru (correspond) to 2-basho renzoku yusho (2 consecutive yusho).

In recent years, however, 12-3 yushos are very common. Can a 13 followed by a 12 earn you 2 yushos? Sure, why not, with no Asashouryuu/Hakuhou/Harumafuji to stop you, that could easily happen. Every full calendar year since 2021 has at least one instance where the makuuchi yusho was no higher than 13-2 in one basho and no higher than 12-3 in the basho immediately following it. So, based on the admittedly fuzzy Japanese, I don't see this as a soft promotion.

[Asashosakari 19,340]

1 hour ago, Atenzan said:

In recent years, however, 12-3 yushos are very common. Can a 13 followed by a 12 earn you 2 yushos? Sure, why not, with no Asashouryuu/Hakuhou/Harumafuji to stop you, that could easily happen. Every full calendar year since 2021 has at least one instance where the makuuchi yusho was no higher than 13-2 in one basho and no higher than 12-3 in the basho immediately following it. So, based on the admittedly fuzzy Japanese, I don't see this as a soft promotion.

It's more that, generally speaking, if we see a rikishi winning exactly 12 and he's not already a yokozuna, the likelihood is high that a) it's a better performance than what he had in the preceding basho + b) he won't be replicating that level of performance in the next tournament either. 12 is "overachiever" territory, the kind of result that lots of guys can put up when the stars align for them. Obviously Hoshoryu's run isn't like that since he did have the 13 in November, but it's just very much the exception from what usually happens, which is why 12-3's are rarely on anybody's mind when it comes to tsuna runs. Wakanohana certainly was given quite a bit of crap for finishing his double-yusho (!) run on a 12-3 Y back in the day. Perhaps that indeed has to change now that 12-3's have become such a common yusho score, but the fundamental issue that 12 wins aren't just the domain of truly exceptional rikishi has not changed, IMHO.

(But it's amusing that even on here some people were ready to declare the end of that "12 can win championships" situation a mere year ago, after Kirishima and Terunofuji had back-to-back 13-2's... Since then: A 13-2 by a M17 with nobody else posting more than 11 wins, and three 12-3's by high-rankers in five tournaments.)

Edited January 30 by Asashosakari

[RabidJohn 1,788]

There's no denying the absence of a truly exceptional rikishi on the dohyo over the last few years.
Terunofuji was for a while during his comeback and climb to the top, but we all knew he had time-bomb knees.

That said, I've been really enjoying all the new and unexpected yusho winners: the run of hatsu yusho at the Hatsu basho, the sekiwake/komusubi yusho, and the M17s.
Kinbozan going on a tear this time was fabulous, as was Oho showing us he's not reached his ceiling.

The fact is, parity makes for great, unpredictable competition.
IMHO, the main difference between, say, Wakatakakage, Kirishima and Hoshoryu is that the latter has managed to stay fit and healthy.

I've convinced myself that we're due another dominant rikishi very soon, though, and I've a feeling it might be Onosato.
We could well have started moaning about him winning everything by this time next year...

[just_some_guy 278]

2 hours ago, RabidJohn said:

I've convinced myself that we're due another dominant rikishi very soon, though, and I've a feeling it might be Onosato.

He's slowed down a tad the past 2 basho (I'll chalk it up to an Ozeki promotion hangover) but he's my first pick to be the next dominator. Takerufuji is a possibility as well, though he also isn't in the form he was when he won his yusho. A mix of recovering from injury and a hesitance to risk re-injury would be my guess.

Edited January 30 by just_some_guy

[Sumo Spiffy 560]

7 hours ago, just_some_guy said:

He's slowed down a tad the past 2 basho (I'll chalk it up to an Ozeki promotion hangover) but he's my first pick to be the next dominator. Takerufuji is a possibility as well, though he also isn't in the form he was when he won his yusho. A mix of recovering from injury and a hesitance to risk re-injury would be my guess.

Both these guys are falling prey more often to opponents playing with their balance. Either one can get to the top if they fix that, but that can be easier said than done.

[yorikiried by fate 2,028]

10 hours ago, RabidJohn said:

That said, I've been really enjoying all the new and unexpected yusho winners: the run of hatsu yusho at the Hatsu basho, the sekiwake/komusubi yusho, and the M17s.

I totally get where you are coming from. Nothing worse than Hakuho's total dominance after Asashoryu was retired.

That being said, personally I enjoyed the phase before that, when two to three high performers were fighting for every single yusho, allowing the required wins for winning the thing to slip below 13 only once in eight years. It also made Harumafuji's and Kotomitsuki's Ozeki runs, as well as Kotooshu's yusho so much more memorable.

Now you see historically low wins-to-yusho averages. While that can be a source of entertainment, I really don't enjoy the constant threat of Neverheardofazuma yushoing with 12 from M23.

[Sakura 1,489]

31 minutes ago, yorikiried by fate said:

 two to three high performers were fighting for every single yusho,

This is my preferred state of affairs in sports in general. 

[Akinomaki 40,523]

On 17/01/2025 at 10:17, Jakusotsu said:

Indeed. I guess Asahiyama will be grilled.

Indeed, he was

[just_some_guy 278]

17 hours ago, yorikiried by fate said:

That being said, personally I enjoyed the phase before that, when two to three high performers were fighting for every single yusho, allowing the required wins for winning the thing to slip below 13 only once in eight years. It also made Harumafuji's and Kotomitsuki's Ozeki runs, as well as Kotooshu's yusho so much more memorable.

It's wild looking back on a time when an Ozeki taking a yusho was uncommon and the thought of someone below Ozeki winning was absurd.