Four days to go and we have sumo’s three best tied for the lead with a few opportunistic challengers lurking behind.
Should be a fun final few days.
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What an exciting final day it’s shaped up to be. The two Yokozuna and the new Ozeki to be all tied up with one bout to go.
So cool seeing the three of them (+ Kotozakura) rotating against each other for the final three days. Can’t wait to see what happens tonight!
Ugh, those plans have been canceled. Onosato’s gone kyujo on the final day.
So Hoshoryu gets a free win and it’s down to Aonishiki to beat Kotozakura to force a playoff.
What a giant bummer.
Wow!
Wow indeed!
Hoshoryu just can’t figure him out. To my very amateur eyes, it looks like Hoshoryu really wants to beat Aonishiki at his own game. Maybe too much pride in his own ability at technical wrestling? I think he’d fare much better if he just tried to blast Aonishiki out of the ring at the tachiai.
Interesting circle going on with the three top guys right now:
Aonishiki 4-0 vs Hoshoryu
Hoshoryu 7-2 vs Onosato
Onosato 3-0 vs Aonishiki
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Ukrainian guy takes it!
Nice call here
Does he get Ozeki rank if he doesn’t ship it? Doesn’t seem like he would have.
His Japanese is excellent as well–especially for having only been in the country for about three years.
Even that depends. If he lost to Kotozakura to finish 11-4 it would have been borderline. But beating the Ozeki only to lose in the playoff to the Yokozuna? I think they promote him for sure in that instance.
That is Hoshoryu’s own bread and butter though. He’s a belt grappler, where as Onosato, who fares much better against Aonishiki, is a blaster. Until now, Hoshoryu was by far the best at the belt game post-Hakuho, but yeah, Aonishiki feels to me like the second coming of Hakuho in terms of pure technical skill. Obviously we’ll have to see how his actual career shakes out but the early returns are GOAT-level.
Anyone remember/recognize this guy?
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Almost unrecognizable.
Makes sense. But Hoshoryu is versatile and pretty damn strong, certainly stronger than Aonishiki at this stage. I still think he should try power instead. Because yeah, Aonishiki is just too masterful on the belt.
Really fun that all three of them are still young! Barring injury, should be lots of great matches between them in the years ahead.
I read that his promotion was even slightly unusual in this spot because he did not have a sanyaku rank in his last 3 tournaments (even though he got enough wins, he was a Maegashira two tournaments ago). Apparently it’s uncommon to jump to ozeki without holding a sanyaku rank for the 3 tournaments prior to promotion (but not unprecedented as it has happened a handful of times before). That’s why I think he might not have gotten it if he doesn’t win the playoff.
tochinoshin? slightly more recognizable than takakeisho, and he’s been retired a lot longer
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also I was a little surprised by Kusano changing his ringname to Yoshinofuji, I was under the impression that the norm was that name changes were for big occasions such as breaking into the top division or an ozeki/yokozuna promotion.
Sometimes rikishi are assigned shikona right when they join a heya. Sometimes they fight under their own name until they break into the sekitori ranks (juryo & makuuchi). As you mentioned, sometimes they change from a prior shikona to a new one when they reach Ozeki or Yokozuna (like Kotozakura (Kotonowaka) and Harumafuji (Ama) before him. In some rare cases, like Endo, they fight under their own name for their whole career.
In Kusano’s case, Kusano is his given name, but there was a lot going on in his heya that probably delayed his shikona naming. He was originally recruited by Hakuho as part of Miyagino-beya before they got put together with Isegahama-beya. The plan was for Miyagino (Hakuho) to eventually regain his heya and take back his rikishi. But he quit sumo instead. Meanwhile, the former Isegahama Oyakata (former Asahifuji) retired and Terunofuji took over the heya.
All this happened over the past year so it probably just took a while for things to get settled and the new Isegahama Oyakata to get around to giving him a proper name.
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I’m just now finishing up, on day 13, it seemed pretty clear to me that Onosato’s elbow hit the ground before Aionishki’s foot hit outside the ring.