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Day 14 Comments (Mike Wesemann reporting)
The big news the morning of Day 14 was that Ozeki Hoshoryu had pulled out of the basho due to an MCL sprain in his right knee suffered in his nimai-geri loss to Kirishima the previous day. After the bout, Hoshoryu was not limping on that knee, and he was able to exit the dohyo without incident. There was also no mention of the injury on the broadcast, and so the withdrawal was a huge surprise. When it was announced in the arena today, there was a noticeable reaction of shock among the fans in attendance, and so the withdrawal was quite unexpected, especially since Hoshoryu was slated to fight Terunofuji in the day's final match.

I went back and watched the tape after the Kirishima - Hoshoryu bout on Day 13, and it did take Hoshoryu a bit to get up from a position where he was kneeling face down at the edge of the dohyo after the loss. He had a noticeable grimace on his face when he got up and as he sat on his cushion ringside afterwards, but nobody picked up that he might possibly be injured because he wasn't favoring the right leg or limping and so everyone must have figured that he was grimacing due to the loss.

Hoshoryu has had the knee taped up the entire basho, and at the start of the broadcast, they reported that Hoshoryu's intention was to sit out today and then fight tomorrow, but his stablemaster stopped him from attempting a comeback on senshuraku where his opponent would have likely been Kotonowaka.

Regardless of all that, Hoshoryu's absence cut in half the number of bouts to be contested for the yusho from two down to one, and it meant the leaderboard was now whittled down to three rikishi as follows:

11-2: Terunofuji, Kirishima, Kotonowaka

Because Terunofuji would get the freebie, it guaranteed the Yokozuna a 12-2 mark, and so the new final bout of the day would determine who would join the Yokozuna in the yusho race on senshuraku.

Let's get right to that bout that featured Ozeki Kirishima vs. Suckiwake Kotonowaka. I mentioned a couple of days ago that it made no sense to have Kirishima secure Yokozuna promotion along with Kotonowaka's being promoted to Ozeki. There's no rule that says you can't do that, but if you had both of those guys get promoted, they'd be obligated to make a bigger deal out of the new Yokozuna and so Kotonowaka wouldn't get as much of the spotlight. In short, both promotions were not going to happen after this basho, so it was up to the Kirishima camp to decide what to do.

Kirishima won the tachi-ai (which goes without saying), and with Kotonowaka standing upright instead of moving forward, Kirishima was able to move the Suckiwake a half step back with very mild tsuppari. After two seconds, Kirishima extended his left arm into Kotonowaka's neck as pictured at right, but the Ozeki wasn't driving with his legs opting to just stand there as if to say, "Okay dumbass, make your move already."

If you look at the still shot at right, you can see that Kotonowaka is not protecting himself whatsoever. His right arm is to the outside; his left arm is completely out of play and off to the side; and his feet are not positioned for him to effectively swipe with that right arm. As for Kirishima, he could have easily assumed moro-zashi at any point, but he just stood there, and I knew what was coming next.

After a few seconds of that stance, Kotonowaka offered a small swipe with the right arm, and that was the Ozeki's cue to just duck down and stumble forward, and that enabled Kotonowaka to grab him by the back of the belt and push him out from behind to the delight of the crowd.

I didn't think that Kirishima was going to throw this one coming in, but sure enough, he did. The entire bout was fought in Kotonowaka's half of the dohyo, and it's just not in the nature of the elite Mongolian rikishi to stand still and do nothing if they're intent is to win.

They were pressed for time at the end of this, and so they couldn't show any replays, and the last comments of the broadcast were of Isegahama-oyakata saying, "Kirishima's tachi-ai was a failure." I noticed afterwards that Wakanohana in his propaganda piece that he writes daily for Nikkan Sports also had the headline, "Why did Kirishima just stand there and look at his opponent from the tachi-ai."  Even Hakuho added in the press, "There wasn't a single thing good about Kirishima's sumo."

I mean, those are valid points made by those dudes, and the easy answer is that he wasn't trying to win, so of course you're not coming in hot from the tachi-ai, and of course you're going to stand there and let your opponent make a move. I think the bigger question in the media should be, "Why aren't they talking about Kotonowaka's sumo and what he did to win?"

And that's how it goes with yaocho.  You have to direct the attention away from the fact that the bout was fixed, and so you do that by tearing down the sumo of the guy who lost while completely ignoring the lack of any sumo from the dude who won. It took Kotonowaka about 10 seconds to finally do anything today, but it doesn't matter. Kirishima let him win and move to 12-2 while the Ozeki graciously takes himself down a notch to 11-3.

Hoshoryu's withdraw throws a wrench into Kotonowaka's matchup for senshuraku, and while they hadn't decided tomorrow's pairings by the end of the broadcast, I got up this morning to see that Kotonowaka is paired against M4 Tobizaru. What, Mitakeumi wasn't available?? The ironic thing is...Tobizaru could easily get to the inside of Kotonowaka's tachi-ai and beat him, but I just don't see how Tobizaru would try and win that bout.

That should give Kotonowaka a 13-2 finish, and then it'd be up to Terunofuji to drop his bout against Kirishima, which would give Kotonowaka the yusho on the spot.

If you asked me to guess the conclusion of the yusho race, I'd say this:

- Tobizaru will fold against Kotonowaka (and exaggerate his dive just for good measure)
- Terunofuji will beat Kirishima
- Terunofuji will beat Kotonowaka in the playoff

Regardless of how it plays out, I'm sure Kotonowaka is a lock for the Ozeki rank, and he provides the first piece of how they want to build the future of Japan's elite rikishi. Guys like Onosato and Hakuohho are coming next, and who knows...we may see Takerufuji vying for an elite rank in a year's time. We'll just have to see how it plays out.

In other bouts of interest, I think it says a lot that when they showed the top three bouts streamed from yesterday and Asanoyama's bout against Gonoyama was #1. #2 and #3 were the final two bouts of Day 13 that featured the yusho guys, but what does it say when the fans want to see Asanoyama over the guys in the yusho race?

Today M7 Asanoyama was paired against M1 Atamifuji, and what a good example of a bout where it feels like both guys lost. The tachi-ai here was actually decent as the two hooked up in migi-yotsu with Atamifuji reaching for a left outer grip, and his fingers were right there touching Asanoyama's belt, but then Atamifuji began a quick retreat and he didn't go for a pull until he had stepped out of the dohyo. The pull had Asanoyama falling gut first to the deck, but since Atamifuji had already stepped out, Asanoyama was the winner. They ruled it yori-kiri, but there was no force coming from Asanoyama's torso or arms applying pressure to Atamifuji. This was all Atamifuji start to finish as Asanoyama bites the dust big time and still manages to..um..win. Asanoyama moves to 9-5 with the gift while Atamifuji falls to 6-8.

A new Juryo rikishi named Takerufuji that I spotlighted early on in the basho clinched the Juryo yusho today, and they showed his bout against Chiyosakae. From the tachi-ai, Chiyosakae stood straight up and put his hands up high faking a pull, and as Chiyosakae started to backpedal, Takerufuji followed him and connected on a few shoves into his torso to send him back and across in two seconds.

This bout was fixed for sure. Anybody can do what Takerufuji did today against an opponent who stands straight up at the charge, puts his hands up high, and then backs up for no reason. I mean, Takerufuji was quick and connected on some powerful shoves, which is more than we've seen from Onosato, but the bout was still fixed I'm sorry to say.

M6 Shonannoumi continues to get favors called in. Today against M13 Churanoumi, Shonannoumi moved forward a step from the tachi-ai, ducked his head, and literally waited for Churanoumi (6-8) to poke him in the side of the shoulder, and Shonannoumi (3-11) went down like a sack'a potatoes.

M14 Onosho continued to pad his record today against M9 Meisei. Onosho was dominated at the tachi-ai as acknowledged by Isegahama-oyakata providing color today, and Meisei had Onosho upright and hopping sideways towards the edge with the insurmountable left inside position, but Meisei held up just enough to where Onosho sorta went for a kubi-nage, and Meisei dipped his right shoulder and actually turned so he fell on his back across the edge before Onosho tumbled out. Easy yaocho call here as Onosho buys his way to 9-5 while Meisei can sell one more at 8-6 and sitll rise up the banzuke.

M15 Onosato and M10 Sadanoumi hooked up in migi-yotsu from the tachi-ai, and with Onosato coming in largely upright, Sadanoumi reached for and got a nice left outer grip near the front of the belt. With Onosato applying zero pressure, Sadanoumi went for an early outer belt throw, and Sadanoumi's left leg was positioned perfectly inside of Onosato's right to aid the throw, but the SadaMight suddenly relented on the throw and allowed the action to flow back to the center of the ring. With Sadanoumi now retreating to the center of the dohyo for no reason and still dragging Onosato directly into his body with the belt grip, Onosato was able to use his right leg and trip Sadanoumi backwards and off the dohyo.

This was planned suicide by Sadanoumi for sure. I mean, he had Onosato by the short hairs two seconds in and was in the perfect position to throw him over, but not only did he abandon the move, but he hurriedly backed up pulling his opponent into his own body. The only way it makes sense is if the bout was fixed beforehand, and it surely was, and once again Onosato picks up a cheap win where he didn't have to do anything to earn it. Where have I seen that before?? He moves to 10-4 with the gift while Sadanoumi falls to 6-8.

And finally, M17 Shimazuumi kept his hands low at the tachi-ai perhaps fishing for moro-zashi against M11 Tsurugisho, and so Tsurugi the Hutt grabbed an early left outer grip, planted his feet, and executed a sweet uwate-nage in less than three seconds that threw the rookie into a heap at the edge of the dohyo. It's always good to see a real uwate-nage, and this one was legit for sure as Tsurugisho picks up kachi-koshi at 8-6 while Shimazuumi falls to 9-5.

This has been as successful a basho for the Association as they've had in a while. Everyone is going to be glued to senshuraku, and it looks like they'll get a fairly young Japanese Ozeki to make it two Mongolian Ozeki and two Japanese Ozeki.

Day 13 Comments (Mike Wesemann reporting)
For the first time in a very long time, we have a yusho race that involves four of the five top dudes ranked on the banzuke. The final two matches the final three days are for all the marbles, and so you'd think nothing would be able to knock the yusho race down to second place in the headlines, but sure enough, there's one story that was able to do it, and that was the announcement that Asanoyama was returning from his kyujo after spraining his ankle on Day 8. It's quite unbelievable to me that a dude whose almost 30 years old and ranked at Maegashira 7 can command such headlines, but there's a lot going on in sumo these days that is hard to believe if you know what I mean.

The last couple of days, they've been panning the rafters the first half of the broadcast in between bouts, and they'll inevitably come across a group of students in uniform dutifully attending the sumos. On the weekdays, there have been several hundred students in attendance that take up huge chunks of seats in the rafters, and it's all part of a smart campaign by the Association to fill the cheap seats and also try and get youngsters interested in sumo. I'm not sure how much they charge the schools for sending their students to the basho, but it's a good way to pad the attendance figures.



Trying to get through the first hour and forty minutes lately has me looking like that dude pictured at lower right, and if I was that school chick, I'd be way more interested in looking at my sleeping classmate instead of watching Myogiryu purposefully lose to Midorifuji too. In general, you can see how bored all of the students who aren't wandering the halls are, and how can you blame them?

As we began the day, Kotonowaka was in sole possession of the lead, but today's the day when he had to start fighting the remaining three Mongolians, so we'd really find out a lot. As such, let's start with the final two bouts of the day, which featured all the dudes on the leaderboard going head to head.

Up first was the Ozeki duel that featured Kirishima vs. Hoshoryu, and Hoshoryu came with his usual hari-zashi tachi-ai where he slapped with the right hand (lightly in this case) and worked the left arm inside forcing the bout to hidari-yotsu where Hoshoryu gained the right outer grip. Kiribayama immediately countered, however, with a nice inside left belt throw stopping Hoshoryu's momentum and forcing the two to trade places in the ring. Hoshoryu still maintained his right outer grip, and he sorta looked as if he was setting up a force-out charge leading with that right outer grip and his right leg positioned to the outside of Kiribayama's left. Normally, a rikishi does that to pin his foe in place, but I just didn't see real pressure coming from Hoshoryu, and so Kiribayama was able to trip up his fellow Ozeki with a left leg pushing into Hoshoryu's right ankle area. It was a spectacular move no doubt, and they ruled it nimai-geri, a kimari-te not seen in the division for 10 years since Tokitenku did it to Shotenro at the 2014 Hatsu basho.

There's a reason you only see about seven or eight kimari-te in Makuuchi day in and day out, and this just looked like exhibition sumo to me. I could be wrong, but when I first started watching every day of every basho, I quickly realized that when Akebono and Musashimaru fought each other, the dude that needed the win more always got it. The two never duked it out, and I've likened it before back to when Venus and Serena Williams would meet in the finals of a major. The tennis was always average, and you could tell the two were never at each other's throats. That's how it's been with the elite Mongolian rikishi over the years, and that's what it felt like here, so while the move was pretty cool, I think the two were just putting on a show. Yeah, both dudes want to take the yusho you'd presume, but Kiribayama had more on the line with his pending promotion to Yokozuna, and so it was Kiribayama getting the win in keeping pace at 11-2 while Hoshoryu is knocked down a rung on the leaderboard at 10-3.

The final bout of the day featured Yokozuna Terunofuji welcoming Suckiwake Kotonowaka, and Kotonowaka's tachi-ai was terrible as the dude pretty much stood upright. Terunofuji was his usual passive self as he reached for a left outer grip from the start, but when he didn't get it, he wrapped that left arm tightly around Kotonowaka's right arm and reeled the Suckiwake in to where he positioned the right arm so deep beneath Kotonowaka's left armpit the bout was over at that point. Terunofuji began a yori charge and ultimately got the left outer grip near the edge, but it wasn't consequential as the Yokozuna dominated here to no one's surprise. I mean, Kotonowaka wasn't capable of doing anything and he's completely exposed when a dude actually fights him straight up. With the win, Terunofuji moves to 11-2 while Kotonowaka falls to that same mark leaving the updated leaderboard as follows:

11-2: Terunofuji, Kirishima, Kotonowaka
10-3: Hoshoryu

As we look at the matchups tomorrow, Kirishima and Kotonowaka will fight first with Terunofuji and Hoshoryu doing battle next.

Kotonowaka is at the complete mercy of his opponent again, and so we'll see what the Kirishima camp decides to do. Coming into the basho with 20 wins over the last two tournaments, Kotonowaka technically needs 13 wins this basho to secure Ozeki promotion, so he can't afford to lose again. I mean, the Association has lowered that standard for many of the recent Japanese Ozeki starting with Kotoshogiku and Kisenosato, so a 12-3 record should also do it, but we'll see. If the Mongolians feel cold-blooded, both Kirishima and Hoshoryu will kick his ass the next two days, but it's all a matter of politics and whether or not the Ozeki are willing to cooperate. My gut says that Kirishima wins tomorrow, but we shall see.

As for Terunofuji vs. Hoshoryu, I don't see the point of letting Hoshoryu win, so look for the Yokozuna to dominate on his way to the yusho.

As mentioned previously, M7 Asanoyama made his return from the kyujo world to face M3 Gonoyama in hopes of picking up kachi-koshi, and Gonoyama made sure not to put Asanoyama in any danger. Gonoyama did win the tachi-ai with some nice thrusts, and he had Asanoyama backed up a bit and shading to his left, but then Gonoyama relented on the pressure and put his arms forward allowing Asanoyama to go for an uncontested kote-nage with the right. I frequently talk about the absence of nage-no-uchi-ai in sumo, and this was a perfect example of one guy throwing and the other guy going completely limp. In a real bout, Gonoyama would have countered that kote-nage with a left scoop throw or left inside belt throw, but as he did a few seconds into the bout, he kept everything limp for his opponent resulting in that spectacular looking throw. The sheeple loved it for sure as Asanoyama picks up a miraculous kachi-koshi in moving to 8-5!! As for Gonoyama, he falls to a quiet 4-9 and hopefully got paid for his cooperation.

The award for the fakest fall on the day easily goes to M5 Ryuden (3-10) who was the victim of a scoop throw at the hands of M13 Endoh (4-9). Sort of. I've never seen a guy to a 540 roll across the middle of the ring after being scooped by his opponent.

Stop the presses...M17 Shimazuumi picked up a legit win today!! His opponent was none other than M9 Mitakeumi who kept his arms low at the tachi-ai as he is wont to do of late, but the rookie crashed into him hard and demanded moro-zashi, and from there, all Mitakeumi could do was retreat and attempt to mawari-komu around the ring to his right, but Shimazuumi was glued to his foe and executed the perfect yori-kiri with good de-ashi. Hey, I will always give credit where it's due, and Shimazuumi picked up a nice win here in moving to 9-4. As for Mitakeumi, what is he even doing on the banzuke anymore in falling to 5-8?

The second bout of the day featured M15 Onosato paired against M12 Takanosho, and we immediately returned back to the nonsense bout of Onosato losing the tachi-ai (pictured at right) and then miraculously coming back to win in under two seconds. Takanosho caught the rookie with a right paw to the throat immediately standing him up, but instead of building on the tachi-ai by getting inside on his exposed opponent, Takanosho brought his hands down and turned his left hip inward as the two sort of hooked up in migi-yotsu. Onosato grabbed a right outer grip, but before he could mount a force-out charge leading with that grip, Takanosho pretended to maki-kae with the left when all he really did was back out of the ring in a split second with the rookie giving chase.

They ruled it oshi-dashi even though Onosato didn't connect on a single push (watch the slow motion replays), and they couldn't rule it yori-kiri because there was no force being applied from Onosato's body leaning into Takanosho's body. Maybe The Force is just strong in that one as Onosato moves to a cheap 9-4 while Takanosho falls to 8-5.

It's really not worth commenting on any other bouts from the day. All of the drama comes in the last 10 minutes, and then we should continue to see the pattern of guys like Onosato and Asanoyama losing the tachi-ai only to come back and win in seemingly convincing fashion.

Day 12 Comments (Mike Wesemann reporting)
A few times during the Day 12 broadcast, they talked about how rare it is to have a rookie paired against a Yokozuna during a hon-basho. The reference was obviously pointed towards the day's final matchup that featured Terunofuji vs. Onosato. The last rookie to be paired against a Yokozuna was Goeido way back in 2007, and then you had to go back to Tosanoumi in 1995 before then. Nine rikishi so far have accomplished the feat as rookies in modern-day sumo (post WWII), but I think it's worth examining a bit the three rikishi (Tosanoumi, Goeido, Onosato) from the Heisei era who have been paired against Yokozuna as rookies.

Tosanoumi came from a crap stable, the Isegaumi-beya. I know it was a crap stable because I used to visit it all the time when the sumos came to Fukuoka. Tosanoumi was one of my favorite rikishi back then. He was a humble guy, and he'd actually give me the time of day. The stable was completely reliant on a small shrine to house them when they came to Fukuoka, and by contrast, you had mega stables like the Musashigawa-beya and the Futagoyama-beya that had their own buildings in Kyushu. The point I'm getting at is the Isegaumi-beya didn't have a lot of money. Tosanoumi was able to rise to Sekiwake a few times in his career based on his own ability, but he wasn't Ozeki material nor did his stable have money to get him to Ozeki.

Contrast that with Wakanohana (the third) who was one of Tosanoumi's peers. He was not Ozeki material nor Yokozuna material, but he achieved both of those ranks because his stable had the money.

Tosanoumi was able to fight a Yokozuna as a rookie because he debuted in the Makuuchi division at M7. At the time, the Futagoyama-beya had a Yokozuna (Takanohana), two Ozeki (Wakanohana, Takanonami), a perennial Sekiwake (Akinoshima), and a host of guys that always hung around the jo'i rikishi likeTakatoriki and Misugisato and a few more guys I'm probably forgetting. What that meant is that you'd get to Day 12 or Day 13, and Takanohana as a Yokozuna would have to dip down into the mid-Maegashira ranks to find opponents. I remember when Takanohana fought an M9 on Day 13 (it was Terao) because too many of his stablemates occupied the jo'i. Anyway, Tosanoumi was the lone exception of a rookie who fought a Yokozuna even though he didn't have big money backing him.

Goeido fought from the Sakaigawa-beya...a stable that did have significant money at the time. They always produced a fair amount of sekitori, and they were able to buy Goeido's way to the Ozeki rank not to mention a single career yusho for him. Remember what a clown show it used to be when Goeido, Kotoshogiku, and Kisenosato were our Ozeki? I guess we had a similar version of an Ozeki clown show just over a year ago with Takakeisho, Shodai, and Mitakeumi...all rikishi from stables with money.

And that brings us to Onosato, who comes from the Nishonoseki-beya. When you have an Ichimon named after your stable, you have money, and that's why Onosato was able to buy his way through Juryo so quickly and buy his way into a Yokozuna matchup as a rookie. It stands to reason then that Onosato is going to be a future Ozeki...not because he has the ability but because his stable has the money.

Just look at Kotonowaka...the top Ozeki candidate. The Sadogatake-beya has produced the most sekitori of any stable since I've been watching sumo the last three decades, and they definitely have the money to boost Kotonowaka to the Ozeki rank. This stable was so rich they held their own international exhibition (jungyo) in Israel about a dozen years back. What has Kotonowaka shown us this basho or any basho? What's his most impressive win? What's his favorite technique? What are his skills? Nobody can answer any of those questions because they aren't displayed in the ring, and yet, this dude is already on the doorstep of the Ozeki rank.

It's unfortunate, but if you're a Japanese rikishi in today's version of sumo, the only way you're gonna achieve the elite ranks is if you buy your way there. I'd love to see someone do it on their own, but such a rikishi from Japan simply doesn't exist right now. It doesn't mean we won't see it happen in the future, but I thought it'd be helpful to explain what a Japanese dude needs in order to become an Ozeki or a Yokozuna (and sustain yourself at those ranks) in this day and age: money.

Okay, enough of that. Let's turn our focus to the Day 12 action starting with the dudes on the leaderboard coming into the day:

10-1: Kotonowaka
9-2: Terunofuji, Kirishima, Hoshoryu

First up among the leaders was Suckiwake Kotonowaka who was paired against M14 Onosho, and you knew that Onosho would come with the same resolve he used against Onosato earlier in the basho. Or not (and that's an understatement). Onosho won the tachi-ai as he used some nice pushes into Kotonowaka's chest to move the Suckiwake back a half step, but then Onosho ducked his head, leaned it into the chest of his opponent, and then just put two palms to the dirt as if he was pulled down. Kotonowaka tried to catch up with Onosho's fall using a wild left slap, but it was far too late as Onosho (8-4) hit the deck all on his own. From start to finish, it maybe took two seconds.

They went to the mukou-joumen chair for comments during the replays, and Oshiogawa-oyakata (former Takekaze) laughed sheepishly and said, "It ended too quickly." He hemmed and hawed a bit more and then said Kotonowaka is heavy and nimble, and that's why he won. When the bouts are fake, they never describe actual moves that the winner used because they're just not there, and so they have to use adjectives like nimble, and heavy, and persistent, and patient, and swift, etc. Apparently, Kotonowaka's success the entire basho has been due to his size and being nimble, so there you have it. Good de-ashi or a good oshi attack or sweet belt skills just don't matter. In order to become an Ozeki, you need to be nimble. I've been educated.

The next leader was Ozeki Hoshoryu who was paired against M12 Takanosho, and Hoshoryu gave us a carbon copy of his throw against Onosato yesterday. After a quick hari-zashi tachi-ai from the Mongolian where he slapped with the left and got the right arm inside, he immediately began executing an inside belt throw with that right before Takanosho knew what hit him, and the result was another spectacular throw from Hoshoryu.

In watching the news, it did not look good to have Kotonowaka win like a pansy and then have Hoshoryu come out and heave his opponent into the air like that...with an inside belt throw no less.  Hoshoryu keeps pace with the win at 10-2 while Takanosho redefined the term "deer in the headlights" in falling to 8-4.

The next bout featured Ozeki Kirishima vs. M10 Tamawashi, and to no one's surprise, Tamawashi let Kirishima win. Tamawashi easily won the tachi-ai driving the Ozeki back a full step, but all Kirishima could do was try and swipe at Tamawashi's extended arms from the side. It wasn't working at all, but Tamawashi wasn't trying to win, and so he literally ducked his head and waited for Kirishima to pull him down by the back of the head with both hands. As Tamawashi fell, he wildly kicked his legs up in ridiculous fashion, and there was absolutely no force coming from Kirishima the entire bout to generate the type of power that would cause Tamawashi to fall like that. You win some and you lose some, and we were cheated with Kotonowaka and Kirishima while being rewarded by Hoshoryu. Kirishima keeps pace on the leaderboard at 10-2 while Tamawashi falls to 7-5.

In the day's final bout, Yokozuna Terunofuji and M15 Onosato hooked up in migi-yotsu from the tachi-ai, and with Onosato completely lost, the Yokozuna grabbed an easy left outer grip, planted his feet properly, and then unleashed another mammoth uwate-nage that spilled Onosato out of the ring in spectacular fashion. This was of course a complete mismatch, and once again, Onosato was unable to defend himself at the tachi-ai or even muster a counter move. Terunofuji moves to 10-2 and looks like a Yokozuna while Onosato falls to 8-4.

As expected, all four leaders won today to guarantee some intriguing round robin play
among them over the final three days.

Tomorrow Kotonowaka is paired against Terunofuji and Kirishima gets Hoshoryu.

The Terunofuji - Kotonowaka matchup goes without saying. Terunofuji is the 100% favorite in a straight up bout, and I think we'll get a straight up bout tomorrow. I can easily see Terunofuji running the table from here and taking the yusho.

As for Kirishima and Hoshoryu, there's no doubt that Hoshoryu is the hotter rikishi, and I give him the advantage in a straight up bout. I think Hoshoryu's going to win regardless to prevent Kirishima from being promoted to Yokozuna. What's the point of having Kotonowaka promoted to Ozeki if they're going to promote Kirishima to Yokozuna after the same basho?? You want the spotlight solely on the Japanese rikishi.

Predicting yaocho is tough, but it makes sense to have Terunofuji yusho at 13-2, Hoshoryu and Kotonowaka jun-yusho at 12-3, and Kirishima fall short at 10-5. I would love nothing more than to see the bouts among these leaders all fought straight up the next few days...which would mean Kotonowaka would NOT be promoted to Ozeki at 11-4, but let's just see what happens.

In the meantime, this is what we have to work with heading into Day 13:

11-1: Kotonowaka
10-2: Terunofuji, Kirishima, Hoshoryu

Regardless of what happens, the Sumo Association has to be ecstatic with the way this finish is setting up because all three days matter...a lot.

Okay, there were a few other bouts of interest on the day, so let's review them next.

In between the Kotonowaka bout with Onosho and the Hoshoryu - Takanosho matchup, Suckiwake Daieisho welcomed M5 Ryuden, and the latter promptly stood straight up at the tachi-ai with arms out wide, and that enabled Daieisho to connect on a few tsuppari. Daieisho's thrusts lacked power, however, and so Ryuden was able to use an inashi and send Daieisho off balance to his right, but Ryuden stopped short of using that momentum shift to easily force Daieisho out from the side, and so you knew at that point that Ryuden was gonna let Daieisho win. And he did staying upright so Daieisho could attempt a few more weak tsuppari before Ryuden just put his palms down to the dirt after a very weak slap attempt from Daieisho. Daieisho moves to 7-5 with the cheap win while Ryuden his hoarding cash at 3-9. I mean, when you're stringing along all those mistresses, it costs money.

Just prior to the Kotonowaka matchup, M3 Gonoyama visited Komusubi Ura, and the bout is not worth recapping, but the ending sure was good. After refusing to beat Ura into a pulp the entire bout, Gonoyama anticipated a pull from Ura (3-9) that never came, and so Gonoyama (4-8) just flopped to the dirt with no contact from his opponent. We'll see if that makes the top three streamed bouts tomorrow. Wouldn't surprise me.

M14 Kotoshoho was looking for his first kachi-koshi in the division since January of last year, and he needed to get through M1 Wakamotoharu to do it. Kotoshoho actually went for a hari-zashi tachi-ai slapping with the left hand and then getting that arm inside forcing the bout to hidari-yotsu. Maybe why he doesn't do the hari-zashi more is because he gave up the right outer to WMH too easily, but the grip was only on one fold of the belt and that enabled Kotoshoho to wrench the M1 upright and use a left scoop throw motion and right tsuki-otoshi back to back, which moved Wakamotoharu to the brink. Wakamotoharu dug in at that point going for a last-gasp tsuki-otoshi with the left, but Kotoshoho was able to bludgeon him down to where Wakamotoharu's right leg touched down before Kotoshoho crashed to the dirt. This bout was well-contested as Kotoshoho finally scores kachi-koshi at 8-4 while Wakamotoharu will shed no tears in falling to the same mark.

Finally, Churanoumi's tachi-ai was weak where he stood straight up and put his hands out in a defensive position, but M17 Shimazuumi didn't blow him off the starting lines. Far from it as Churanoumi had the clear path to the right frontal belt grip. He fondled it for a second then pulled his hand away before grabbing it for real but then letting it go an instant later. I mean, Churanoumi coulda taken moro-zashi at any point, but it was clear he was standing around waiting for the rookie to make a move. Shimazuumi finally went for a bad kote-nage with the left, and it was about 33% effective with the other 66% being made up by Churanoumi (5-7) dipping his left elbow and shoulder down to the dirt. As expected, Shimazuumi's fan club buys him a kachi-koshi at 8-4, but it's been completely undeserved.

We'll end with that and look forward to the final two bouts of the day tomorrow.

Day 11 Comments (Mike Wesemann reporting)
One of the problems with all three of the Mongolians competing until the end of the basho is that they suck up a lot of wins from everyone else. I mean, yeah, all three have dropped two bouts each on purpose, but there is a real dearth of anyone with a good record that isn't on the leaderboard. A lot of times you're in the position that if the guy in sole possession of the lead loses, it adds another five or six dudes to the leaderboard, but this basho it's been slim pickins for sure, and it's a symptom of the three Mongolians competing for the yusho and the two rookies buying wins hand over fist at the bottom of the ranks.

Because there was really nothing going on until the final 20 minutes of the day, let's go into leaderboard mode and cover only the bouts of interest.

At the start of the day, the rikishi in the hunt for the yusho were the following:

9-1: Kotonowaka
8-2: Terunofuji, Kirishima, Hoshoryu, Onosho, Onosato

All of the leaders fought in the final four bouts of the day, so let's start there going in chronological order.

First up was Suckiwake Kotonowaka who was paired against...M11 Ohho?? Are you kidding me? You have a dude leading the basho and vying for Ozeki and you feed him a six-win Ohho on Day 11? Unbelievable.

It may be that they were trying to generate cheap headlines like, "These two are grandsons of Yokozuna who fought each other back in the 70's, and here the grandson's are fighting each other today!!" Whatever.

From the tachi-ai, Ohho couldn't decide if he wanted to thrust with the left or come with a kachi-age, so he showed a hybrid of both way up high, and that allowed Kotonowaka to swipe sideways at that extended arm and nudge Ohho to his left. Ohho moved to the edge of the dohyo and fired tepid tsuppari Kotonowaka's way that actually worked because Kotonowaka's attack was that weak. I mean, at one point, Ohho caught the Suckiwake with a right thrust that knocked KNW back towards the center of the ring, but instead of advancing, Ohho just moved left going into pull mode, and he stood there allowing Kotonowaka to push into his chest and score the unearned oshi-dashi in the process.  I mean, Ohho was far more concerned about looking for a soft landing than he was in looking at his opponent. Impressive for Kotonowaka it wasn't as he buys his way to 10-1 while Ohho knows his place at 6-5.

Up next was Ozeki Kirishima paired against Suckiwake Daieisho, and the tachi-ai was even with both dudes looking to thrust cautiously. When Daieisho was unable to connect on a firm blow, it allowed Kirishima to briefly advance and think about a right outer grip, but he relented and continued his thrust attack. Kirishima wasn't kicking ass and taking names here, but Daieisho wasn't connecting on anything, and so the Ozeki shaded a bit right pushing Daieisho sideways, and the Suckiwake was off balance from there allowing Kirishima to finish him off tsuki-dashi style. It wasn't great sumo, but Kirishima was never in trouble as he improves to 9-2 while Daieisho falls to 6-5.

Ozeki Hoshoryu took advantage of M15 Onosato's weak tachi-ai by getting the right arm inside and left outer grip, and with the rookie fumbling around, Hoshoryu wasted no time in going for an inside belt throw that dispatched Onosato without argument. That was a ballsy move to throw with the inside right instead of the safer outside left, and the exertion it took to throw Onosato off his feet and down with the lesser belt hold caused Hoshoryu to hit the deck as well, but this was quite impressive when you look at the size difference between these two rikishi. I love watching the Mongolians work their craft like this as Hoshoryu moves to 9-2 while Onosato falls to 8-3.

In the final bout of the day, Yokozuna Terunofuji and M14 Onosho struck well at the tachi-ai, and the Yokozuna used both arms to grab at Onosho's extended right arm and pull him sideways into a left outer grip, and from there, the Yokozuna rushed Onosho out in seconds flat. I mean, it's not even a contest when you get these yayhoos who pad their record all basho and then suddenly find themselves paired against elite rikishi who are out to win. Terunofuji breezes his way to 9-2 while Onosho falls to 8-3.

With the dust settled after the final four bouts, the leaderboard is whittled down
as follows:

10-1: Kotonowaka
9-2: Terunofuji, Kirishima, Hoshoryu

Kotonowaka gets Onosho tomorrow, and Onosho is the better rikishi of the two and could easily get inside from the tachi-ai and win a straight up fight, so we'll see what the Onosho camp decides to do.

Terunofuji draws Onosato, and that one goes without saying. I did see where that matchup gave a few members of the media a stiffie and caused them to write, "Fighting a Yokozuna in his first Makuuchi basho!!"

Kirishima gets Tamawashi, and I would be totally shocked if Tamawashi decides to beat the Ozeki noting that Tamawashi is the best rikishi on the banzuke.

Finally, Hoshoryu gets Takanosho meaning they can preserve this leaderboard as-is moving into Friday. There is also a path to where the remaining four can all fight each other over the final three days, so let's hope they don't handle Kotonowaka with kid gloves when they set the matchups for Day 13.

There were a few other matchups of interest on the day, so let's cherry pick 'em instead of wasting time on so many other uncontested bouts.

M2 Abi revealed the blueprint to beating Komusubi Ura today. Just beat him into a pulp with tsuppari until he's vulnerable enough to be slapped down. Abi picks up a much needed win in moving to 5-6 while Ura is still largely depending on charity in falling to 2-9.

M1 Wakamotoharu aligned his feet and left himself completely exposed at the tachi-ai against M10 Tamawashi, who had the clear path to the left arm inside and right outer grip, but the Mongolian was playing nice by refusing to take advantage. Instead, Tamawashi kept his arms forward in a defensive posture as WMH thought about getting his left arm inside, but he was hemming and hawing, and so Tamawashi went into pull mode without actually pulling, and the cheap oshi-dashi win for Wakamotoharu was academic from there (yawn). Wakamotoharu picks up kachi-koshi at 8-3 with the cheap win while Tamawashi falls to 7-4, and remember, it was Wakamotoharu who saddled Kotonowaka with his only loss, and WMH destroyed the basho leader.

I'm not gonna describe the M6 Kinbohzan - M12 Myogiryu matchup blow by blow, but it was one of the better matches on the day. You had one of Japan's best fighting the best guy to enter the division over the last year, and it was a closely fought bout where Kinbohzan's sheer strength won out in the ends.

They hype dudes like Onosato to no end, but you can't even compare Onosato to Kinbohzan. Kin-kun throws a ton of bouts because he can, but when you watch the bouts where he's trying to win, it really is beautiful sumo...something we just don't see from very many Japanese rikishi, especially the guys getting all the ink.

M17 Shimazuumi and M10 Sadanoumi hooked up in migi-yotsu from the tachi-ai where the Sadamight grabbed the easy left outer grip, but instead of digging in, Sadanoumi kept his right arm up high as if to maybe go for a neck throw, and all that did was give the rookie the free moro-zashi. Shimazuumi was still unable to force Sadanoumi back against his will, and so Sadanoumi (4-7) just backed out of the ring gifting Shimazuumi 7-4. Just great. They're going to buy the rookie a kachi-koshi meaning we have to put up with him again next basho.

And finally, M12 Takanosho led off the day battling M14 Kotoshoho in a bout that quickly went to hidari-yotsu with KSH forcing Takanosho back to the edge in a flash thanks to his insurmountable left inside position that had Takanosho's right arm pointing to the ceiling. Kotoshoho stopped his attack at the edge conveniently and then turned his body away from his strong side (the left inside) and allowed Takanosho to attack with his left arm. It took a bit for Takanosho to clue in, but he was able to slip left and execute a weak scoop throw, and because Kotoshoho was compromised, the move allowed Takanosho to get moro-zashi and fiddle around with a force-out charge leading with that left arm. Kotoshoho made it easier by faking a kubi-nage, which only kept him upright and vulnerable, and Kotoshoho (7-4) never protested near the edge as Takanosho..um..forced him across. Takanosho was gifted kachi-koshi at 8-3, and he's technically still part of the yusho race (he fights Hoshoryu tomorrow as previously noted), which is why he was worth the mention. Or was he?

I don't expect any upsets tomorrow among the leaders, so look for a mostly filler day that will really allow them to hype up the final three days of the shootin' match.

Day 10 Comments (Mike Wesemann reporting)
Entering Day 10, the four yusho candidates had come down to Terunofuji, Kiribayama, Hoshoryu, and Kotonowaka. I realize there are two others mathematically in the race, but Onosho and Onosato are not going to take the yusho despite the headlines I've been reading that say, "Onosato could be the first rookie to take the yusho in 110 years!!" Or not. Anyone whose forced to look at the rafters by his smaller opponent at the tachi-ai (that's Meisei doing that to the rookie on Day 9) is not going to take the yusho.

It's coming down to one of the Mongolians or Kotonowaka, and the problem with Kotonowaka is there really isn't any buzz surrounding him from the fans. Despite this "run" to Ozeki and the withdrawal of Asanoyama, Kotonowaka still can't make the list of top three bouts streamed from the previous day; whereas, the Mongolian rikishi are popping in and out of that list from time to time. Hopefully it's just because people want to see good sumo.

With no real buzz going on in the media besides yusho speculation, let's get right to the Day 10 bouts going in chronological order. That means we start with M17 Shimazuumi and M12 Myogiryu who hooked up in migi-yotsu from the tachi-ai where Myogiryu grabbed the easy left outer grip against his defenseless opponent. Instead of setting up his foe for the quick yori-kiri, Myogiryu instead moved away from his outside position, which is the complete opposite of what you should do with an outer grip. When I saw this I knew the bout was thrown immediately, and so Myogiryu continued to spin away from his outer all the while letting Shimazuumi take about four seconds to complete a maki-kae, and after setting the table for his opponent by backing to the edge and letting go of any position, Myogiryu was forced down and onto Kotooshu's lap who was judging ringside. This was as fake as they come as Shimazuumi has yet to pick up a clean victory at 6-4 while Myogiryu's retirement portfolio just got a bit sweeter despite falling to 3-7.

M11 Tsurugisho attempted to redefine the hari-zashi tachi-ai by slapping at your opponent's face and then leaving your insides exposed instead of slapping and getting an arm to the inside. M14 Kotoshoho took full advantage of his opponent's intentional mistake assuming the left inside position and right outer grip. But wait...there's more!! Tsurugi the Hutt was already setting himself up at the edge, so it took maybe half a second for Kotoshoho to score the cheap yori-kiri after assuming his grips. Kotoshoho buys this one in moving to 7-3 while Tsurugisho pads the billfold at 4-6.

M10 Sadanoumi and M16 Bushozan hooked up in hidari-yotsu from the tachi-ai, and Bushozan immediately began a retreat with Sadanoumi in tow. To sweeten the pot, Bushozan brought his left arm from the inside out giving Sadanoumi moro-zashi with a firm frontal belt grip, and the entire thing lasted about two seconds in favor of Sadanoumi. I'm not sure if Bushozan's actions were intentional or if he's really that hapless, but both dudes end the day at 4-6.

M16 Takarafuji looked to get the left arm inside at the tachi-ai against M9 Mitakeumi, but the latter ducked low and kept both arms in tight. While Mitakeumi was defending himself like a turtle in his shell, he was in no position to attack, and so Takarafuji finally went for a left inashi swipe that threw Mitakeumi off balance, and Takarafuji rushed in from there getting moro-zashi scoring the easy yori-kiri after the initial stalemate in the beginning. Takarafuji moves to 5-5 with the easy win while Mitakeumi falls to 4-6.

M8 Hiradoumi darted forward at the tachi-ai looking to get inside, but M15 Tomokaze caught him with two hands to the throat to keep him at bay. Hiradoumi was still pressing forward, however, and Tomokaze agreed to give him ground, and once he was close to the edge he went for a surprise pull and was able to slap Hiradoumi down before the latter pushed TK out. Tomokaze moves to just 2-8 with the win while Hiradoumi falls to 4-6.

M7 Ichiyamamoto used his length to dominate the tachi-ai against M13 Churanoumi catching Churanoumi by the neck with the left and pushing him back near the edge. As Churanoumi tried to swipe away at IYM's arms and lean back forward, Ichiyamamoto reversed gears and went for the quick slapdown. Churanoumi falls to 5-5 while Ichiyamamoto improves to 4-6.

M6 Shonannoumi put on a clinic today on how not to try and win a sumo bout. Against M13 Endoh, he stood straight up with arms wide open allowing Endoh to move forward and push a willing Shonannoumi back and across before the bout really began. Endoh stutter-stepped at the tachi-ai, and even with the awkward start, SNNU was so mukiryoku it was over in two seconds. Endoh moves to 3-7 wile Shonannoumi is shedding some debt here in falling to 1-9.

In a very similar bout, M5 Nishikigi left himself completely exposed at the tachi-ai giving M9 Meisei moro-zashi, and it was a combination of Nishikigi backing up willingly and Meisei moving forward, and the result was a 1.5 second win force out win for Meisei that incredibly contained no force. Meisei moves to 6-4 with the gift while Nishikigi falls to 5-5, and I don't know what's more disturbing...these last two bouts or the fact that one of those two people in pink is a dude:



M4Tobizaru struck M12 Takanosho at the tachi-ai and then immediately backed up pretending to pull, so about eight seconds of wild sumo ensued where Takanosho first chased Tobizaru around looking to connect on shoves while Tobizaru pretended to be of a mindset to pull even though he never attempted anything. Towards the end of the bout, it was Takanosho who looked to set up a pull, and it was obvious to everyone including Tobizaru, but he just walked right into it and then exaggerated his exit out of the ring that included grazing Kotooshu who sat judging the bout ringside. This bout was fixed from the start as Takanosho moves to 7-3 while Tobizaru needlessly added his flair to things in falling to 5-5.

The crowd was thrilled with this but, and I can't really blame them. There are so many uncontested bouts these days that they get something like this, and they're willing to overlook the complete lack of sumo basics in exchange for a little excitement.

M3 Gonoyama caught M4 Shodai from the tachi-ai with a nice stiff arm, but he was shading backwards. Shodai isn't plain good enough to take advantage, and so as he pressed forward, Gonoyama moved left changing places in the dohyo with his foe before finally executing a forward-moving oshi attack against which Shodai could not defend himself. It wasn't pretty, but it was straight up as Gonoyama limps to 3-7 while Shodai falls to 4-6.

M2 Abi came with his usual tsuppari attack against M5 Ryuden, but Abi's thrusts didn't have any bite. Fortunately for him, Ryuden wasn't trying to get inside, and so he pretended to trade tit for tsuppari tat with Abi, and about seven seconds in, Abi went for the lightest of pulls against Ryuden's extended right arm, and Ryuden dutifully fell to his hands and knees. Abi oils his way to 4-6 with the cheap win while Ryuden falls to 3-7.

M11 Ohho sorta fished for a moro-te-zuki from the tachi-ai against M1 Wakamotoharu, but Ohho wasn't using his legs and so WMH was able to get up and under Ohho's outstretched right arm, and that was Ohho's cue to just back up and around the ring as if to pull, but he never attempted the move and instead backed out of the ring with zero contact coming from Wakamotoharu. I mean, Wakamotoharu was closing in, but when Ohho stepped out, WMH still had his hands extended as if he needed to push one last time. Nope. Ohho (6-4) just plain walked back and out giving Wakamotoharu (7-3) the freebie.

M10 Tamawashi caught M1 Atamifuji with a nice choke hold using the right hand, but he wasn't driving AF back with his legs, so with Tamawashi standing there playing nice, Atamifuji decided to evade back and to his left fishing for a pull. It was a bad attempt for sure, but Tamawashi didn't finish him off even though he could have, so Atamifuji continued to dance around the straw to his left while Tamawashi was purposefully slow in catching up. The two finally hooked back up in the center of the ring where Tamawashi looked to be setting up a right kote-nage, but before he could do the throw, Atamifuji just dove backwards to the dirt. Tamawashi feeling like he had to respond dove to the dirt himself the opposite way despite anything that Atamifuji did, and so the ending was two dudes fake falling to the dohyo in wild fashion. Atamifuji definitely hit first knocking him down to 4-6 while Tamawashi moves to 7-3 after the ugly display of (can we really call it?) sumo.

For some reason they decided to schedule the midget wrestling undercard on the day to take place here in the middle of Makuuchi, and so M2 Midorifuji and Komusubi Ura both stayed low after a fiddy-fiddy tachi-ai, and after a few seconds of grappling Ura went for a dumb pull that Midorifuji read perfectly, and so Midorifuji (3-7) drove Ura (2-8) back hard sending him off the dohyo altogether.

The most anticipated bout on the day was M15 Onosato traveling up high on the banzuke to take on Suckiwake Kotonowaka, and as expected, this one was a complete dud in favor of Baby Waka. Onosato's tachi-ai was slow as he stood up with his arms completely exposed, and so Kotonowaka moved in getting moro-zashi, and there was no counter move as Kotonowaka forced him back and out easy as you please. If you have access to the replays, focus on Onosato's left hand, and you can see the palm is fully opened with the fingers spread apart (see pic at right), and when a rikishi purposefully takes his hand out of play like that, the bout is fixed. Asanoyama used to do that all the time, and he was a guy who rarely participated in a straight up bout.

Politics dictated that Kotonowaka win this one, and so the bout wasn't even contested unfortunately as Kotonowaka moves to 9-1 while Onosato falls to 8-2.

Ozeki Hoshoryu whiffed on a hari-te attempt against Suckiwake Daieisho, but Daieisho was timid from the tachi-ai, so he couldn't' t take advantage. After the awkward tachi-ai, the two traded light tsuppari before Hoshoryu grabbed Daieisho's extended left arm and pulled him off balance and directly into a Hoshoryu right outer grip. From there, Hoshoryu dragged Daieisho clear across the dohyo and pushed him out from behind picking up the easy if not ugly win at 8-2. As for Daieisho, he's still in a decent spot record-wise at 6-4.

Ozeki Kirishima agreed to stand toe to toe with M14 Onosho and trade tsuppari, but neither dude was making much progress. A few seconds in, Kirishima lunged for a right outer grip, but Onosho moved out of the way, so the two traded a few more thrusts until Kirishima darted to his left executing an offensive pull that caused Onosho to collapse to the dirt. Like the bout before, this one contained few sumo basics and could be described as a wild affair. Regardless, Kirishima improves to 8-2 while Onosho falls to the same mark.

In the day's final bout, M6 Kinbohzan traveled to the top of the banzuke to take on Yokozuna Terunofuji, but he didn't even try against the Yokozuna. The two hooked up in migi-yotsu from the tachi-ai where Terunofuji grabbed the left outer grip, and from that point, Kinbohzan used his left hand in the same manner as Onosato a few bouts before...which means he didn't use it, and so Terunofuji reeled him in snug and then planted his leg before throwing Kinbohzan over and down uwate-nage style.

Perhaps Kinbohzan knew he was had the moment Terunofuji got that outer grip, but I at least wanted the youngster to dig in and make it difficult. Instead, he gave up and then put his left palm down to help break the fall of the throw. Kinbohzan falls to 5-5 while Terunofuji skates to 8-2 and reminds us of what a real uwate-nage looks like.

With the dust settled, the leaderboard that NHK finally started showing the second half of the broadcast now looks like this:

9-1: Kotonowaka
8-2: Terunofuji, Kirishima, Hoshoryu, Onosho, Onosato

Onosato draws Hoshoryu tomorrow and Onosho is paired against Terunofuji, and I just don't see the point of needing to throw the bouts in favor of the two Ono's.

Kirishima is paired against Daieisho, and the question there is: do we really want another Mongolian Yokozuna? Personally, I don't. I hate to see rikishi reach the Yokozuna rank and even the Ozeki rank without being tested, and let's suppose Kirishima does get promoted to Yokozuna after this basho. What stands out from his sumo the last two basho? Right, nothing. I like Kirishima, and he's a legit Ozeki on this banzuke, but deep down, I don' t want to see him promoted at this point.

As for Kotonowaka, they're feeding him Ohho tomorrow, and talk about a copout matchup. Ohho can easily be bought, but if there's some political reason why the bout wouldn't be fixed, Ohho can definitely win. He's gone through a tougher basho than Kotonowaka, and he's got the size to do it.

A fixed bout will be an easy oshi-dashi win for Kotonowaka. A real bout will likely end in a pull maneuver, and I'd put the odds at fiddy-fiddy between the two.

The drama is in the politics.

Day 9 Comments (Mike Wesemann reporting)
The big news by far as we head into the second week was the announcement from the Asanoyama camp that he has withdrawn from the tournament citing a sprained right ankle. Fighting in his first straight up bout of the basho against Tamawashi on Day 8, Asanoyama was being moved around the ring this way and that as a result of Tamawashi's tsuppari attack, and with Asanoyama's body moving one way, Tamawashi executed a scoop throw the other way, and that sudden reversal of gears caused Asanoyama's right foot to get caught against the dohyo just prior to the throw.

Asanoyama got up slowly, but he was able to climb back atop the dohyo and go through the usual post-bout rituals. There wasn't a noticeable limp as he walked back to the locker room, but we've all sprained our ankles before and know that the pain or swelling really doesn't set in until you've rested the joint overnight.

There was increased swelling and pain in the ankle the morning of Day 9, and the Asanoyama camp made the determination that he'd have to withdraw.

The real issue here is that Asanoyama wasn't prepared for the straight up bout. You can't fight seven fake puff bouts in a row and then get involved in a real bout with a Mongolian whose out to beat you and not risk serious injury. I mean, the last time this dude went kyujo he was thrown down hard by Hoshoryu, another Mongolian. Yes, injuries do happen in sumo, but if Asanoyama had the ability to stand his ground against Tamawashi instead of being blown about by the wind, this injury wouldn't have occurred.

His withdrawal is a sizeable blow to the basho. He's easily the most popular rikishi right now, so to have him bow out like this is a gut punch. It also doesn't look good that a dude who was undefeated and supposedly on a tear this basho got injured in a very methodic bout at the hands of the oldest guy in the division. And that's the problem with bout fixing in sumo. The illusion has to be sustained every day, and when someone throws a wrench in things as Tamawashi did yesterday, this is exactly what happens.

NHK News 9 devoted like three times their usual allotted time for sumo during the sports segment at the end of Day 9, and I'm pretty sure it was a plea from the Sumo Association saying, "Hey, the main guy is out, but please push these other storylines." And they dutifully did, and then when all was said and done they showed the obligatory Terunofuji bout at the very end. Ya know, as if they're saving the best for last.

Switching gears just a bit, it's been really hard to get a sense of the yusho race this basho because the guys at the top don't deserve it. Their ranks on the banzuke are also weak, and I'm pretty sure there's a handful of oyakata who are embarrassed about what's going on. The Sumo Association has yet to display the leaderboard (even at the end of Day 9), and I don't blame them. It's just obvious when you have the elite Mongolians showing flashes of brilliant sumo who are lower on the leaderboard than scrubs like Onosato and Kotonowaka. I mean, has Onosho left a palm print on the chest of a single opponent this basho? The answer is actually no, and people can just tell.

To display a leaderboard where dudes like Onosato and Kotonowaka will check in above the Yokozuna and two Ozeki is galling, and that's why they're not showing it. The fans who actually shell out money to watch this and the sheep who believe everything they are spoon fed by the media will believe it, but remember, everyone else watches the nightly news shows as well, and the typical male in the 18-54 year-old demographic will easily see through the shenanigans, and so they don't make it too obvious.

Getting back to the leaderboard, they'll have no choice by the end of Day 10 but to show one, and that's why they've paired Onosato against Kotonowaka tomorrow. They just need to saddle these dudes with more losses to make things more palpable.

With that, let's go through all of the Day 9 bouts starting with M15 Tomokaze vs. M13 Endoh. Tomokaze put a left hand forward catching Endoh in the neck, but Tomokaze wasn't looking to move forward. Instead, he began a methodic retreat faking pull attempts as Endoh simply followed him back for the easy push-out win. This bout was one-side and not because Endoh (2-7) was kicking ass and taking names. Tomokaze suffers make-koshi with the defeat in falling to 1-8.

M12 Myogiryu connected with a right palm to the side of M16 Bushozan's face at the tachi-ai before executing methodic tsuppari. Bushozan was hapless from the get-go and so he attempted to move left and tug at the side of Myogiryu's arm, but the latter adjusted well and began a retreat where he went for a pull and Bushozan walked right into it. This sumo lacked any fighting spirit as Myogiryu limps to 3-6 while Bushozan falls to 4-5.

The tachi-ai between M12 Takanosho and M16 Takarafuji was very good, but Takarafuji looked to retreat after getting the left arm inside instead of stand his ground, and so Takanosho followed that retreat easy peasy pushing Takarafuji back and across in mere seconds. They climaxed..er..uh..peaked at the tachi-ai, and everything went downhill from there as Takanosho moves to 6-3 with Takarafuji falling to 4-5.

M11 Ohho kept his arms wide open at the tachi-ai gifting M17 Shimazuumi moro-zashi, and since the rookie didn't gain that position due to a good tachi-ai, he needed Ohho to fake a few pulls whose actual purpose was to leave him vulnerable and in a retreating mode. It took a bit of effort for Shimazuumi to "force" his opponent across the straw, but Ohho let him win in falling to 6-3 while Shimazuumi moves a step above .500 at 5-4.

M10 Sadanoumi and M14 Kotoshoho hooked up in migi-yotsu from the tachi-ai, and it was Sadanoumi grabbing the early left outer grip. Instead of positioning himself a bit to his opponent's right side, which is what you're supposed to do with the left outer grip, Sadanoumi stayed completely square and upright, and so as Kotoshoho went for a very slow-developing counter scoop throw with the right, Sadanoumi (3-6) played along and just danced to the edge of the straw before being scooped over and down by Kotoshoho who buys his way to 6-3.

M15 Onosato and M9 Meisei struck well at the tachi-ai, but it was Meisei who had Onosato looking upwards with a nice right paw to the throat. Instead of applying pressure or getting moro-zashi, however, Meisei responded by wrapping his left arm around the outside of Onosato's right arm, and then Meisei just marched sideways as if to set up that throw, but darn the luck, he accidentally walked outta the dohyo before he could execute anything. It was all Onosato could do to keep up, and once again, Onosato loses the tachi-ai yet ends up winning the bout in under three seconds without employing a single offensive move.  In the pic, who is actually in control of the bout?  Not the winner.

If you really watch what's going on and analyze the sumo, it's so easy to see, but the majority of the people don't want to see it. With the "win," Onosato picks up kachi-koshi at 8-1 while Meisei will take the cash in falling to 5-4.

M13 Churanoumi latched onto the front of M9 Mitakeumi's belt from the tachi-ai as Mitakeumi countered with a right outer grip, but Churanoumi easily moved laterally and used his superior position to set up a right outer of his own that completely pinched Mitakeumi's left arm inside and useless. From there, Churanoumi knocked his foe upright and executed the perfect force-out move. Mitakeumi held onto Churanoumi's belt way too long causing both to fall into the crowd, but this was the best sumo we've seen from Churanoumi in this division. It was very technical and well-executed, but it does say something that it occurred against someone as washed up as Mitakeumi (4-5). Churanoumi moves to 5-4 with the very nice win, and I love watching sumo like this.

M14 Onosho picked up the freebie due to M7 Asanoyama's withdrawal, and so Onosho is the quiet dude on the leaderboard at 8-1 while Asanoyama will finish the basho at 7-8.

Before we move on, you only need to revisit the Onosho - Onosato matchup from Day 3 to realize how big of a fraud this Onosato 8-1 start has been. I'm not saying the dude is completely useless. I actually see potential in the kid, but that doesn't mean he's been doing anything noteworthy this basho other than buying seven of his eight wins.

M7 Ichiyamamoto put both hands high at the back of M11 Tsurugisho's head in the pull position, but the pull never came, and so that enabled Tsurugisho to rush forward and push his self-compromised opponent back and across in about two seconds. That's one way to throw a bout as Kotoshoho falls to 3-6 with Tsurugi the Hutt improving to 4-5, and I think KSH simply owed Tsurugisho one here.

M10 Tamawashi shaded to his left at the tachi-ai catching M6 Shonannoumi with a vicious right choke hold while he pressed into the side of SNNU with the left hand, and there was nothing Shonannoumi could do here as Tamawashi pushed him over to the side and dispatched the kid in just a few seconds. Tamawashi moves to 6-3 with the dismantling while Shonannoumi suffers make-koshi at 1-8, and the reality is...Shonannoumi is having a bunch of favors called in this basho.

I have been waiting all basho for M6 Kinbohzan to do what he did today against M8 Hiradoumi because I think it's the perfect illustration of how a guy with game actually wins in a matter of seconds, and it can be used to contrast just what Onosato isn't doing while still winning all these bouts.

From the tachi-ai, Kinbohzan caught M8 Hiradoumi with a paw to the throat, and then followed it up with another paw to the throat, and Hiradoumi had no choice but to evade to his left and go for a desperate pull. He made Kinbohzan stutter every so slightly, but the Kazakhstani had the de-ashi working from the tachi-ai, and so he was able to adjust on a dime, stay square, and push Hiradoumi out nearly onto the chief judge's lap.

What we saw from Kinbohzan today is how the media and NHK Announcers are trying to portray Onosato, but the difference between these two rikishi couldn't be more stark. Onosato makes very little contact with his opponents; his de-ashi are mostly non-existent; he never chokes his opponents from the tachi-ai; and he's chasing guys out of the ring instead of using force to push them out of the ring.

M4 Tobizaru picked up the freebie against M3 Hokutofuji, who withdrew this morning after taking a bad spill from the dohyo in his bout with Hoshoryu yesterday. Hokutofuji was out of gas by the time Hoshoryu sent him back off the clay mound, and the M3 landed hard and awkwardly on the arena floor below injuring his knee in the process. Tobizaru moves to 5-4 and has received plenty of gifts this basho while Hokutofuji will finish at 4-11.

M2 Abi henka'd to his right, grabbed the back of M3 Gonoyama's belt, and dumped his foe to the dirt a second in. Hmm.  They ruled it uwate-nage, but this is NOT the kind of uwate-nage move I was referring to earlier in the basho. Regardless, Abi moves to just 3-6 while Gonoyama is a hapless 2-7, and like Shonannoumi, this dude is having favors called in this basho as well.

M2 Midorifuji latched onto a frontal belt grip against M1 Wakamotoharu but was just asking for trouble going chest to chest with a larger foe like that, and as WMH pressed in close, Midorifuji wrapped his right arm around Wakamotoharu's neck in kubi-nage fashion, but Wakamotoharu just tackled him to the dirt before he could execute a move. You watch a bout like this and then wonder how Midorifuji is ever able to execute a kata-sukashi. The easy answer is his opponents let him do it. Wakamotoharu was obviously not playing around today as he moves to 6-3 with Midorifuji falling to 2-7.

M1 Atamifuji kept his arms wide open at the tachi-ai against Komusubi Ura allowing the latter to burrow in tight. Now, when Atamifuji was supposedly making all of those runs the last few basho, he was leaving himself exposed like this at the tachi-ai, but his reaction once Ura was inside is the key point. Or should I say his non-reaction? Instead of wrapping Ura up tight from the outside and using his weight to press in on him, Atamifuji faked a few pulls and set himself up at the edge, and with Ura having a right arm positioned up and under in perfect kata-sukashi fashion, he started executing the move but Atamifuji wildly slid across the straw and stepped out before the shoulder slap actually came.

Perhaps the most telling bout of the day was Suckiwake Kotonowaka - Suckiwake Daieisho matchup where Kotonowaka was completely exposed at the tachi-ai allowing Daieisho to execute his usual tsuppari attack. Daieisho had KNW knocked back a step and a half from the get-go, but then he literally slowed down his attack and stood more upright signaling to Kotonowaka that he was giving him an opening. So what was Kotonowaka's response? He actually took another half step back and went into pull mode, which is suicide if a dude is looking to push you out. Daieisho of course wasn't, and his response was to pretend to go for a pull himself, which was actually an excuse to back up all the way across the dohyo and let Kotonowaka "force" him across in the end.

All I can do is shake my head at how brazen this all is, and like the Onosato bout before...the dude who dominated the tachi-ai and did all the work was the one who voluntarily backed himself outta the dohyo. Kotonowaka's record improves to 8-1, but this is about as hollow of an 8-1 as I've ever seen. As for Daieisho, he falls to 6-3 but lines his mawashi with a bit more cash.

As mentioned in the intro, Kotonowaka and Onosato are paired against each other on Day 10 because they can't afford such poor sumo to be scrutinized on all of the news shows, and so one of them is going to have to take a step back. I wouldn't be surprised with the winner of tomorrow's bout (likely Kotonowaka) losing the day after just so they can bring these two back to the pack a bit.

Ozeki Kirishima struck M4 Shodai well from the tachi-ai standing him upright with methodical tsuppari before assuming moro-zashi, but the Ozeki was intentionally sloppy and hurried in his force out charge and that allowed Shodai to sorta execute a kote-nage with the left, but he didn't have a good grip and the move was hurried, but Kirishima still raced outta the dohyo as he forced Shodai across.

They ruled in favor of Shodai as it looked like Kirishima was throwing the bout, they called a mono-ii and correctly said that Shodai' stepped out first. I don't believe it was Kirishima's intention to lose this bout, but he was being sloppy on purpose in giving Shodai an opening. The end result is Kirishima's moving to 7-2, but this didn't exactly conjure up thoughts of Yokozuna sumo...which I think was the point. As for Shodai, he falls to 4-5 in defeat.

Ozeki Hoshoryu and M5 Ryuden hooked up in hidari-yotsu where the Ozeki grabbed the early right outer grip, and Hoshoryu never let Ryuden get settled as he used the outer grip and inside position to move Ryuden to the other side of the dohyo before forcing him across. It was textbook yori-kiri sumo worth of an actual Ozeki as Hoshoryu moves to 7-2 while Ryuden is a quiet 3-6.

Yokozuna Terunofuji and M5 Nishikigi looked to hook up in hidari-yotsu from the tachi-ai, but before they could get settled and press in chest to chest, the Yokozuna executed an early kote-nage with the right that sent Nishikigi off balance. There was too much real estate to send Nishikigi out for good, so NG recovered and was able to back up to his left going for a swipe, but it largely missed and allowed the Yokozuna to swoop into the migi-yotsu position with a stifling left outer grip, and it was academic from there as Terunofuji scored the nice yori-kiri win.  Terunofuji joins his Mongolian counterparts at 7-2 while Nishikigi settles for 5-4.

I loved these last two bouts because it showed the viewers what actual sound sumo looks like from elite rikishi, and that's why I think Kotonowaka and Onosato need to be brought back to the pack. People will undoubtedly compare the sumo content in their minds and realize the huge discrepancy, and here's an interesting comparison of three bouts that ended in yori-kiri today and the Association's illustration of what a yori-kiri looks like:

In case you can't tell, from left to right that's Kotonowaka vs. Daieisho, Meisei vs. Onosato, Terunofuji vs. Nishikigi, and one yellow bird against another yellow bird.

I'm not gonna post a leaderboard until NHK does, but one of the Mongolians is the heavy favorite to yusho at this point you'd have to think.

Day 7 Comments (Mike Wesemann reporting)
Before I watched the bouts today, I turned on NHK's Saturday News Watch show as it's quite an extended version of news and sports, and so I was interested to see the coverage of sumo. They only showed two bouts, Terunofuji vs. Shodai and Asanoyama vs. Meisei, but I think what was really telling from the broadcast was their coverage of the Australian Open. The only highlights they showed were from a 2nd round women's double match that involved Japanese partners Eri Hozumi and Makoto Ninomiya where they lost to a Chinese duo 6-3, 6-2.

The first week of the tennis tournament has been very good and most of the seeded players are filling up the brackets in the round of 16 for both men and women, but the only mention the tournament has received on NHK the entire week was a women's doubles match that featured two Japanese players who lost in convincing fashion.

You have perhaps the greatest of all time in Novak Djokovic and an insane up-and-comer in Carlos Alcaraz, but the focus of the tournament is on two Japanese athletes who were knocked out of the tournament in the 2nd round.

I think this type of coverage helps to explain why sumo operates the way it does. The rikishi with obvious game are not emphasized because they aren't Japanese, and everything is done to present the Japanese rikishi in the best light possible. In those terms, Japan had a pretty good day of sumo on Day 7 and all that mattered was that the right rikishi won regardless of how they did it.

NHK and the Association invited an Olympic Gold Medalist wrestler from the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, Yui Suzaki, into the booth, and she was more refreshing to watch than most of the bouts, that's for sure.

I was a bit perplexed when she said, "Ooh, I can feel the power of the sumo from up here," especially during the obviously fixed bouts, but she knows what her role is in all this.

In the interest of time, let's cover the bouts from the big three Japanese rikishi that are being hyped this basho.

We start with M15 Onosato who was paired against M11 Ohho, and the tachi-ai consisted of Ohho standing upright with his arms extended outward as he moved to his right and then backed up to the edge of the straw and across. Onosato easily kept pace with a right arm sorta to the inside, but it was barely forearm deep and had no impact on Ohho's movements. Ohho simply left himself exposed at the tachi-ai and then pretended to go for a pull that was really an excuse to just set himself up for the quick loss.

That parts didn't matter, however. What's important that Onosato won and it looked to be in convincing fashion to the sheep. He moves to 6-1 with the gift while Ohho had plenty of room to give in falling to 5-2.

Next up for team Japan was M7 Asanoyama who did battle...so to speak...with M9 Meisei. The two hooked up in migi-yotsu from the tachi-ai, and early on Meisei had Asanoyama upright with the clear path to a left frontal belt grip that would have pinned Asanoyama's right arm in useless, but instead of executing that move, Meisei just backed up and let Asanoyama score the easy, uncontested yori-kiri. All you need to do is watch what Meisei does with that left hand after he refuses to grab the belt. He keep his hand balled into a fist and leaves it in between both rikishi, so this was essentially Asanoyama defeating the one-armed man.

To the fans it looked like a decisive victory for Asanoyama, and that's all anybody wants to see, so it's 2 for 2 so far in keeping fan interest as high as they can get it. Asanoyama is unblemished on paper now at 7-0 while the Meisei camp is doing their part at 4-3.

The final Japanese rikishi that is being spotlighted albeit far less than Asanoyama and Onosato is Suckiwake Kotonowaka who was paired against M5 Ryuden today. These two rikishi also hooked up in migi-yotsu from the tachi-ai, and Ryuden was positioned perfectly down low with his head underneath Kotonowaka's jaw and his left arm positioned right at the side of Kotonowaka's belt. Except he forgot to grab the easy outer grip darn the luck! Like Meisei before, Ryuden just kept one arm completely out of harm's way, but his positioning was still so good that Kotonowaka didn't have a pot to piss in.  In the pic at right you can see how far extended Kotonowaka was.

Ryuden sensed that Kotonowaka was in no position to attack, so Ryuden decided to move to his right essentially trading places with Kotonowaka in the dohyo before backing up to the edge. Kotonowaka eventually figured out the yori-kiri, but he did nothing to set it up. Ryuden had to do all the work here, but the end result is a chumoku Japanese rikishi picking up the win! Kotonowaka moves to 6-1 with the gift while Ryuden falls to 3-4, and just like that, the three Japanese rikishi who are receiving the bulk of the attention all won today and would occupy the top two tiers of the leaderboard if NHK had showed one today.

I know most people want to believe that most of sumo wrestling is straight up, but the sport wouldn't survive if that was the case. Like the paltry Australian Open highlights we got on the NHK weekend news show, the focus has to be on the Japanese rikishi or people will lose interest.

I suppose it's worth covering the last three bouts on the day as well since they all involve potential leaders.

Up first was Ozeki Kirishima who traded tsuppari with M3 Hokutofuji from the tachi-ai. Hokutofuji was clearly outclassed here, but all of a sudden Kirishima decided to go for a quick pull, and as he did, he bumped into the gyoji who was positioned directly behind him. With the gyoji down on the mat, it looked like both dudes paused just a second to see if he was okay, and as the ref got up, the two found themselves in the migi-yotsu position with Hokutofuji maintaining a left outer grip but a very weak position with the right arm.

Kirishima executed a mammoth inside belt throw that threw Hokutofuji off balance and gave the Ozeki moro-zashi, and as he was doing this the referee was busy putting his hat back on and pulling the elastic band under his chin and then he looked down to the corner of the dohyo as the yobi-dashi there gave him his sandal back. I mean, you had these two guys going at it in the ring and the ref was worried about getting fully redressed.

Kirishima was facing the ref the whole time, and as soon as he had his clothes back on, Kirishima used another nice inside belt throw with the right to move Hokutofuji back to the edge where he then executed the textbook yori-kiri sending a tired Hokutofuji (4-3) down to the arena floor. Kirishima moves to 6-1 with the win but the bigger news is that the referee's outfit came away unscathed. Whew.

Before we move on, the force that Kirishima showed here in moving his opponent back and across was completely lacking from the first three bouts I covered. Those bouts were all light, puff bouts with very little force exerted from any of the rikishi.

Up next was Ozeki Hoshoryu taking on M4 Tobizaru, and for whatever reason, Hoshoryu came from the tachi-ai with his hands up high gifting Tobizaru moro-zashi, but the Ozeki quickly locked in from the outside and eventually worked the bout to migi-yotsu thanks to Tobizaru's non-existent defense. The two grappled a bit more before Hoshoryu easily ushered the pesky Tobizaru across and out for the decent yori-kiri win. Hoshoryu purposefully dropped his two previous bouts coming into the day, and it looked as if he gave Tobizaru (3-4) an opening at the start of this one, but he came away with the win in the end moving to 5-2.

In the day's final bout, Yokozuna Terunofuji purposefully gave M4 Shodai moro-zashi from the tachi-ai, but unlike Hoshoryu before, the Yokozuna didn't lock in tight from the outside around Shodai's arms. Not only did he fail to lock his foe in tight, but he stood there like a limp rag and allowed Shodai to work him around the ring and to the edge. Shodai didn't quite have the Yokozuna forced out, and so Terunofuji just went with the flow taking a knee across the edge drawing the yori-taoshi technique in favor of Shodai. As if.

This was likely an act of contrition on Terunofuji's part after roughing up Tobizaru a bit yesterday.  That bout dominated the headlines and it was all negative press against the Yokozuna.  In fact, the Terunofuji - Tobizaru bout actually knocked Asanoyama down to #2 in terms of the most streamed bout from the previous day it received that much attention.

This was also a nice cherry on top for the Japanese fans who leave the day realizing that yes, the Mongolian rikishi are vulnerable and anything can happen. NHK didn't show a leaderboard, and rightly so. It's still too early for that, and I don't think they'll show one tomorrow either. Getting back to the politics of things, it doesn't look good for a Maegashira rikishi to stand alone at the top of the leaderboard even if he is Japanese.

Day 6 Comments (Mike Wesemann reporting)
For the second day in a row, the NHK News 9 sports segment did not start off with sumo. Yesterday it was the announcement of newly-elected members to Japan's Baseball Hall of Fame and today it was women's ski jumping from some competition in Europe. The Hatsu Basho is when Sumo really has a chance to grab the spotlight because no other domestic sporting events are occurring, but I can just feel it when I watch the news and people are not clamoring for sumo updates.

Even the Day 6 broadcast was pre-empted by extended news coverage of the current scandal where members of the Jiminto political party loyal to former Prime Minister Abe were pocketing kickbacks from fundraisers.

When my regular broadcast is pre-empted like that it's not a huge deal because NHK will go and playback all of the bouts I missed, but we don't get to see those few minutes right before the Makuuchi bouts start where they spin the hot topics.

Getting back to the NHK News 9 sports segment, I knew they wanted to sing from the rooftops Asanoyama's status as the only undefeated rikishi, but they dutifully started off with the Terunofuji - Tobizaru bout as filler. We can't have a Maegashira rikishi upstaging a Yokozuna you know. It's so Japan, but the politics that goes on behind the scenes should be part of good sumo analysis.

Getting to the bouts themselves, the day began with J1 Mitoryu reaching for a left frontal belt from the tachi-ai, but with M17 Shimazuumi getting the right arm inside and pressing forward, Mitoryu adjusted to his opponent's momentum agreeing to back pedal where he skirted right and timed a perfect scoop throw with the right to send Shimazuumi into the first row. It all happened in about two seconds, and this reminded me of Kyokutenho where he'd let up a bit at the tachi-ai and make his opponent think he was doing well only to show him the trap door in the end. Both rikishi end the day at 3-3 and Shimazuumi's magic the first three days has dried up along with the money the fan club raised to buy those first three bouts.

M15 Tomokaze was noticeably nonchalant at the tachi-ai allowing M16 Bushozan to dictate the pace, and the latter brought a mediocre oshi attack, but Tomokaze's response was to lean a bit forward and lock his legs as if to invite a pull. A pull never came, but with Tomokaze leaning forward like that, Bushozan connected on a mild shove to the chest causing Tomokaze to flop forward and put a knee down. They had to rule it oshi-taoshi, but that's the first time I've ever seen someone lose by an "oshi" kimari-te where they fell forward towards their opponent after getting pushed in the opposite direction. It's the whole business of the inflated "oshi" kimari-te due to bout fixing. When the yaocho occurs, the endings can become entirely unorthodox like this bout here where Bushozan moves to 3-3 with Tomokaze literally falling to 1-5.

M16 Takarafuji stood straight up at the tachi-ai with his arms out wide allowing M15 Onosato to catch him in the chest with some nice shoves, and with Takarafuji agreeing to backpedal in kind, this bout was over in about two seconds. Onosato did exhibit nice oshi skills here, but Takarafuji was mukiryoku all the way and aided in that quick retreat out of the ring. Onosato moves to 5-1, but before you get too excited about him, just recall his only loss to Onosho and how lopsided that was. These veterans could kick the rookie's ass if that was their intention. It surely wasn't Takarafuji's intention today as he had room to sell in falling to 3-3.

M14 Kotoshoho's tachi-ai today was terrible with the dude standing upright, and so with M17 Aoiyama moving forward even slightly, he was able to knock KSH back a step or two. But...Aoiyama was bought off before the bout and so he let Kotoshoho recover and get going on an oshi attack, and as he did so, Aoiyama backed up and faked a half-assed pull from the middle of his body that just aided in his getting pushed across the straw. As Aoiyama looked for a soft landing below, his foot got caught on the dohyo and he wrenched his knee during the dismount. The Pawn Stars graciously brought the wheelchair out for Aoiyama to use, but he declined, so we'll see if he withdraws. Why go kyujo though? If you're going to sell every one of your bouts, you may as well continue to roll in the dough even if your knee is hurt. He falls to 0-6 while Kotoshoho is an overly-inflated 5-1.

M12 Myogiryu put his hands high at the tachi-ai and stood straight up for M14 Onosho, so it goes without saying that Onosho was able to score the uncontested oshi-dashi win against a listless opponent in about two seconds. Like Aoiyama, Myogiryu (1-5) is just hoarding cash at the tail end of his career. As for Onosho, he oils his way to 5-1.

M11 Tsurugisho sorta did a hari-zashi tachi-ai against M12 Takanosho. I mean, he did go for the face slap but he forgot to get an arm inside instead keeping both arms out wide and gifting Takanosho moro-zashi. As for Takanosho, he was sitting on his laurels at the initial charge, but once Tsurugi the Hutt gave him moro-zashi and stopped moving forward, it was Takanosho's turn to start his yori charge, and Tsurugisho (1-5) didn't contest the bout from there. All that took about three uneventful seconds as we have yet another uncontested bout of sumo in Makuuchi with Takanosho finishing the day at 4-2.

M11 Ohho's hands were way too high at the tachi-ai giving M13 Endoh the path to an easy moro-zashi or frontal belt grip if he wanna, but he didn't. Instead, Endoh literally stood there ducked low with his body turned nearly 90 degrees towards his opponent, and he just waited for Ohho to push him back and across. Another two-second bout that was fixed beforehand as Ohho moves to 5-1 with Endoh falling to 1-5.

It was reported that today was the day that Ohho's grandfather, Taiho, kicked the bucket however many years ago, and this was the first time in five tries that Ohho was able to win on his grandfather's meinichi, or death date.

M13 Churanoumi reached for a right frontal grip at the tachi-ai against M10 Sadanoumi whose left arm was to the inside of Churanoumi's right, but instead of Sadanoumi establishing that left arm inside, he took it to the outside giving Churanoumi moro-zashi. To make matters worse, Sadanoumi then put his hands high as if to pull enabling Churanoumi to execute the two-second force-out. Yet another fixed bout that lasted mere seconds as Churanoumi buys his way to 4-2 with Sadanoumi falling to 1-5.

In a very similar bout, M10 Tamawashi stood upright at the tachi-ai failing to move forward, and he kept his arms wide allowing M9 Meisei to push him over and out without any resistance. It's like every bout to this point was the same on the day as Meisei buys his way to 4-2 with Tamawashi settling for 3-3.

M7 Ichiyamamoto caught M9 Mitakeumi with some nice paws to the throat and upper torso at the tachi-ai, and with Mitakeumi completely befuddled and trying to duck back down into the bout, Ichiyamamoto swiped down across Mitakeumi's torso causing him to plop forward and down. It was hard to tell if Mitakeumi was trying or not because I don't think he's capable of a good tachi-ai and defending the attack he saw today anyway, so props to IYM for the nice tachi-ai and good thrust attack that sends him to 2-4 while Mitakeumi doesn't even deserve his 3-3 mark.

The tachi-ai was fiddy-fiddy between M8 Hiradoumi and M6 Shonannoumi, and as Hiradoumi looked to keep his foe upright, Shonannoumi positioned his hands into pull mode, but before he could execute it, Hiradoumi rushed in getting the right arm inside with the left outer grip, and Shonannoumi just backed across without even putting up a fight. I mean, one party looked good here in Hiradoumi (4-2), but are we going to see a bout go over five seconds today where both dudes are trying? Shonannoumi falls to 1-5 with his lackluster effort.

Yes, we finally got a straight up bout with no shenanigans when M5 Ryuden stepped atop the dohyo to pick up the freebie after M8 Hokuseiho's withdrawal due to a bum right knee. At least it was all real as Ryuden moves to 3-3. As for Hokuseiho, his stablemaster, Hakuho, said it's unlikely he'll return, so he's staring at a 2-13 finish.

And that brings us to M7 Asanoyama who was paired against M5 Nishikigi, and Asanoyama struck well at the tachi-ai as the two hooked up in the solid migi-yotsu position. Though Asanoyama struck his foe well at the tachi-ai, he couldn't budge NG back, and so Nishikigi just retreated to the side and around the ring on his own. With neither dude maintaining an outer grip, Asanoyama went for a slow maki-kae with the left and Nishikigi reacted with his own left maki-kae, and then Asanoyama went for another maki-kae now with the right.

As I've said before, a maki-kae is a do or die move, so when you see three in a row like this in the middle of the ring, you know the bout his fake. After all the maki-kae monkey business, the two finally ended up with Asanoyama maintaining a left inside grip and Nishikigi keeping his arm up high after grabbing the right outer, and a weak nage-no-uchi-ai was trying to form, but to have a simultaneous throw from both parties, they both have to throw. Nishikigi didn't even attempt a throw and just went limp before diving to the dirt leading with his left elbow. At least the crowed enjoyed it, but this bout was fully compromised. They ruled it an inside belt throw even though no throw occurred. I mean, Asanoyama tried but to throw, but this was really just a weak dashi-nage with Nishikigi plopping forward and down of his own volition. Asanoyama moves to 6-0 with the gift while Nishikigi is a quiet 3-3.

M6 Kinbohzan struck M4 Shodai well keeping his arms pointed low, and the tachi-ai was good from both parties, but Shodai is obviously no match for the Kazakhstani. With Shodai looking to evade, Kinbohzan caught him with a beefy right forearm just as Shodai attempted an inashi move, and that sent Shodai over to the edge where all Kinbohzan had to do was push OldDai out from behind. Both rikishi end the day at 3-3 after this lopsided affair.

M2 Midorifuji and M3 Hokutofuji exhibited a good tachi-ai with Midorifuji trying to get to the inside, but it was Hokutofuji's thrusts that kept Midorifuji at bay and on defense. With Hokutofuji bearing in, Midorifuji didn't even try and move laterally, so when Hokutofuji set up a pull, Midorifuji simply walked into it as he put both palms down and cart wheeled to the other side of the dohyo. Just prior to the bout, the NHK announcer pointed out that the last time these two met in May of last year, Midorifuji got moro-zashi and won by yori-kiri, so this was just a matter of these two trading wins here. Hokutofuji moves to 4-2 while Midorifuji falls to 1-5.

Komusubi Takayasu made his return after sitting out for three days, and he was paired against fellow Komusubi Ura. Ura didn't try anything sneaky at the tachi-ai, and after Takayasu greeted him with two thrusts up high, the two ended up in hidari-yotsu. Ura ducked forward and let Takayasu grab the right outer grip, and another nage-no-uchi-ai sort of formed, but Ura wasn't trying to throw, and so this was a weak dashi-nage from Takayasu where Ura did most of the flopping on his own with Takayasu stumbling over him. Takayasu moves to 2-4 with the weak win while Ura collects some cash in falling to 1-5.

With Asanoyama buying his way to 6-0, would Suckiwake Kotonowaka be able to do the same against M1 Wakamotoharu? Wakamotoharu was late at the tachi-ai, but Kotonowaka didn't make him pay, and so WMH used a decent right kachi-age before firing a few thrusts Kotonowaka's way. The Suckiwake's response in all this was to extend his left arm forward as if to thrust, but he just kept it there allowing Wakamotoharu to swipe Baby Waka to the side, and with Kotonowaka no longer square to his opponent, Wakamotoharu rushed forward and scored the easy and largely uncontested win pushing Kotonowaka out with ease.

Kotonowaka is not a true Sekiwake, and his sumo skills are largely non-existent, but I don't believe he is this hapless. Wakamotoharu (3-3) let this dude win last time they fought, and it looked as if Kotonowaka was obligated to return the favor here. Kotonowaka falls to 5-1 in defeat, and you gotta wonder how many more prior favors are going to be called in? A dude that wins very few bouts legitimately cannot vie for the Ozeki rank without a lot of shenanigans in play, so we'll see what happens the rest of the way.

Suckiwake Daieisho largely stood upright at the tachi-ai, so while he did thrust with his arms against M1 Atamifuji, there was nothing behind it. That allowed Atamifuji to knock Daieisho back a full step, but Atamifuji didn't (or doesn't?) have the ability to win moving forward, and so he began a defensive retreat, and as Daieisho moved forward, Atamifuji hooked him lightly behind Daieisho's extended right arm, and that was Daieisho's cue to put both palms to the dirt. This was a half kote-nage / half tsuki-otoshi move from Atamifuji that had little strength behind it, but who needs power when your foe will agree to take a dive? That's what we got here as Atamifuji limps forward to 2-4 while Daieisho falls to 4-2.

Ozeki Hoshoryu used the C3P0 arms against M2 Abi at the tachi-ai and literally just stood there as Abi put two hands into Hoshoryu's throat before going for the lightest of pulls. With Hoshoryu waiting for the first move from Abi, he dutifully put both palms to the dirt and that was that. I watch this stuff and just shake my head at the poor quality of sumo these days. Abi "picks up" his first win at 1-5 while Hoshoryu chooses to lose for the second day in a row at 4-2.

Before we move on, I was reading the headlines after the basho, and I was seeing write-ups of this match with Abi being quoted as saying things like, "I know he was watching from above," and "I did this for him."  I read that and I was like did Terao die??  And sure enough, it looks like my ignoring the headlines in between basho caused me to miss the news of Terao's death.  Dang, the dude was only 60 (and I'm 54 now so it hits home), and it felt like he was one of the young guys when I started watching sumo.  Rest in peace, brother.

Ozeki Kirishima executed a nice hari-zashi tachi-ai slapping M3 Gonoyama's face with the right hand while getting the left arm inside, and that subtle move at the tachi-ai allowed Kirishima to grab a right outer grip and deny Gonoyama the same outer on the other side. As Kirishima set his foe up for the yori-kiri, you could see Gonoyama think about a maki-kae with the right, but you can't think about it; it's do or die. With Gonoyama lost at the maki-kae, the Ozeki pounced wrenching his foe to the straw before forcing him across with the left arm inside. Textbook stuff from Kirishima who moves to 5-1 while Gonoyama falls to 2-4.

Speaking of hari-te, M4 Tobizaru went for a face slap against Yokozuna Terunofuji and hit him square in the nose at the tachi-ai. I mean, the hari-te is a legal move but not if you're a clown like Tobizaru and you're fighting a Yokozuna. You have to earn the right to hari-te a Yokozuna, and Tobizaru surely hasn't done that. The slap did throw the Yokozuna out of sorts for just a bit and allowed Tobizaru to maintain separation as he darted around the ring, but the Yokozuna finally caught his foe with a nice choke hold and then a left kote-nage that he used to wrench Tobizaru across the ring before pushing him out. With Tobizaru standing at the edge of the clay mound, Terunofuji gave him a dame-oshi sending him off the dohyo for good, but it wasn't a vicious move. The Yokozuna continued to stare Tobizaru down for three or four seconds before heading back to his corner, and in the good old days of sumo, a Yokozuna would make it a point to seek Tobizaru out for morning keiko prior to the next basho and kick his ass around the dohyo over and over.

Terunofuji was forced to apologize in the press afterwards for his behavior that lacked "hinkaku" (remember that stupid word??), but that's what's wrong with sumo.  These guys need something to get fired up, but the sport has become too soft. We'll see if Terunofuji pays a special keiko visit to Tobizaru in March when the caravan heads to Osaka. I hope so. The end result of this bout is Terunofuji's moving to 5-1 while Tobizaru falls to 3-3.

This was not a good day of sumo for sure, but that ending got me fired up.  Hopefully we get more intensity over the weekend, but I'm not holding my breath.

Day 5 Comments (Mike Wesemann reporting)
As I was covering the final bout on Day 4, there were two words in the coverage that it felt like I hadn't typed in a very long time. The first word was "Terunofuji," which stands to reason since the dude hadn't fought in a bout prior to the basho since last July. The second word was "uwate-nage," or outer belt throw, and it felt as if it's been a long time since we've seen a legitimate uwate-nage. Terunofuji's throw was only the third outer belt throw we've seen over the first four days of action, but the other two uwate-nage both witnessed on Day 2 were results of fixed bouts, so the Yokozuna's sumo was the first time in four days that a dude legitimately set up an outer belt throw and executed it to perfection.

When I first started watching sumo full time 30 years ago, the outer belt throw was a staple kimari-te. You had the likes of Akinoshima, Takanonami, Takanohana, Kaio, and the two Hawaiians, Akebono and Musashimaru. We saw outer belt throws all the time, and they were frequently part of nage-no-uchi-ai, which is when both combatants go for simultaneous throws at the edge.

Asashoryu was extremely adept at the outer belt throw as was Hakuho, Baruto, Harumafuji, Kotooshu, etc. and the kimari-te was alive and well until Sumo decided to completely sell its soul and have Japanese rikishi start taking the yusho again and occupying elite ranks on the banzuke.

The uwate-nage in sumo has quickly become a lost art, and it's been sad to see. At some point last year I talked about how the oshi-dashi kimari-te has become overly-inflated due to bout fixing, and the lack of legitimate uwate-nage is part of the same problem. It's unfortunate, and if you've been watching sumo as long as I have, it's easy to notice the decline in quality sumo.

As expected, we would not see an uwate-nage on Day 5--legitimate or not, and so let's get to the action starting with M17 Aoiyama vs. M15 Onosato. Aoiyama easily won the tachi-ai getting a paw into Onosato's neck standing the rookie upright, but from there Aoiyama went into pull mode without even pulling. With Aoiyama having retreated to the edge, Onosato looked to move forward and attack, but he didn't have any momentum from the tachi-ai as this was all Aoiyama's doing, and so in the end, Aoiyama skirted right along the edge faking another pull before just stepping out.

Go watch the replays and observe that Onosato doesn't connect on a single push at any point of the bout. As Aoiyama is stepping out, the rookie's arms are extended, but he never once connected with Aoiyama's flesh and pushed in a manner that caused Aoiyama to move upright or back. Fake sumo through and through as Onosato is gifted 4-1 while Aoiyama sheepishly falls to 0-5 with more retirement funds.

Next up, our other rookie, M17 Shimazuumi, actually had the path to moro-zashi after a fifty-fifty tachi-ai against M15 Tomokaze, but before he could could get established inside, Tomokaze pushed him upright, and after a few more seconds of grappling, Tomokaze got a paw to Shimazuumi's jaw, which set up a quick kata-sukashi that sent the rookie packing. I was encouraged by Shimazuumi's tachi-ai, but the dude needs to learn to follow up better. Anyway, at 3-2 let's hope more of his bouts are real. As for Tomokaze, he picks up his first win at 1-4.

The tachi-ai between M16 Bushozan and M14 Onosho was decent, but it was Onosho who quickly took charge with a legit thrust attack. As Bushozan looked to evade laterally, Onosho stayed snug and pushed Bushozan back and across in a few seconds. Onosho picks up a nice win here in moving to 4-1 while Bushozan falls to 2-3.

M16 Takarafuji and M13 Endoh traded shoves at the tachi-ai for a second before hooking up in hidari-yotsu. Takarafuji pressed forward fishing for the right outer grip, and Endoh's response was to back up to the edge, and so Takarafuji rode that momentum forcing Endoh back and across largely uncontested. This was a boring affair that was likely arranged as Endoh moves to 3-2 with Endoh falling to 1-4.

M14 Kotoshoho kept M13 Churanoumi at bay with some nice tsuppari before getting Churanoumi in a right kote grip and ushering him over near the edge. Churanoumi slipped out of it, but he was on his heels from that point using desperate thrusts to try and keep Kotoshoho at bay as Churanoumi evaded this way and that, but Kotoshoho had the momentum from the start and stayed snug throughout finally pushing Churanoumi back and across for the nice win. The atmosphere is just different for these real bouts as Kotoshoho sails to 4-1 while Churanoumi falls to 3-2.

M11 Ohho was completely exposed at the tachi-ai giving M12 Myogiryu moro-zashi if he wanted it, but the veteran didn't take it and you knew the bout was fixed at that point. Ohho wasn't exactly kicking ass and taking names in his shove attack, but Myogiryu played along as the punching bag, and it was finally Myogiryu who had to fake a pull and just back out because Ohho's oshi attack was that ineffective. Predictable bout here as Ohho buys his way to 4-1 while Myogiryu falls to 1-4.

M12 Takanosho stuck M10 Sadanoumi with a nice jab from the tachi-ai standing him up, and so the Sadamight tried to evade to his right and throw Takanosho off his game, but the latter squared up nicely and got moro-zashi easily forcing a retreating Sadanoumi back and across from there. Takanosho moves to 3-2 and shows what winning the tachi-ai can do for you while Sadanoumi falls to 1-4.

M11 Tsurugisho kept his arms wide at the tachi-ai giving M9 Meisei what he wanna, and instead of getting both arms inside, Meisei just executed an oshi attack with Tsurugisho more than willing to retreat. It was over in three uneventful seconds and TS did not contest this bout whatsoever. Meisei moves to 3-2 with the nice technique while Tsurugi the Hutt falls to 1-4.

M9 Mitakeumi and M10 Tamawashi executed a bland tachi-ai with both dudes offering thrusts but not moving forward with the lower body. It provided for a soft tachi-ai before Mitakeumi crouched down with both arms in tight so as to keep Tamawashi away from the inside, and Tamawashi played along keeping his arms to the outside but not grabbing an outer grip or executing an inashi, two moves that were there for the taking. The two stood like this for about 30 seconds before Tamawashi thankfully shoved Mitakeumi upright and then across for good leaving both dudes at 3-2.

These early bouts really are unwatchable. The fans are interested in Onosato, but once he's done for the day, they have to slog through all this crap until they get to M7 Asanoyama who welcomed M8 Hiradoumi today. The two were not in perfect sync at the tachi-ai, but what did it matter? The bout was fixed anyway. Hiradoumi latched onto a left frontal grip from the tachi-ai as the bout went to migi-yotsu, but Hiradoumi just backed himself around the ring and out altogether with Asanoyama in tow. It lasted like three seconds, and I don't think these guys ever went chest to chest. It was just this light dance with Hiradoumi grabbing that early outer and then retreating out of the ring. Asanoyama is gifted a 5-0 start, and this is really all sumo has going for it at the moment, which is sad. As for Hiradoumi, he knows his place in falling to 3-2.

M6 Shonannoumi struck M8 Hokuseiho well getting the right arm inside and pinching in with the left so Hokuseiho couldn't grab his own right inside position. They dug in near the starting lines, and unlike the bout before, these two dudes were really going chest to chest in a bout that contained real force. With Shonannoumi's chin resting on Hokuseiho's left shoulder, SNNU didn't have any momentum, so the two stood that way for 15 seconds before Hokuseiho struck first with a nice left kote-nage that threw Shonannoumi off enough to where Hokuseiho was able to secure the right inside. Shonannoumi countered with the left outer grip and we were treated to a nice bout of ai-yotsu from there that went 30 more seconds before Shonannoumi finally mounted a charge leading with the left outer, but Hokuseiho countered nicely with his right inside grip, and a true nage-no-uchi-ai formed at the edge where Hokuseiho was able to dump his foe down for the nice win.

I mean, isn't it obvious? The real sumo vs. the fake sumo? You just take the two most recent bouts, Asanoyama vs. Hiradoumi and this bout here with Hokuseiho and Shonannoumi, and you can't even compare the two. One was obviously fake and the other was definitely real. It wasn't like the classic nage-no-uchi-ai of the past, but I'll take it as Hokuseiho moves to 2-3 with Shonannoumi falling to 1-4.

One Japanese rikishi who is capable of executing a nice uwate-nage is M5 Nishikigi, and he was paired against M7 Ichiyamamoto today. Unfortunately, Nishikigi is also really good at selling bouts, and that's what he did here barely bothering to come out of his crouch at the tachi-ai while Ichiyamamoto pushed the listless Nishikigi back and across without argument. IYM bought his first bout here in moving to 1-4 while Nishikigi had plenty of room to sell in falling to 3-2.

M5 Ryuden is another Japanese rikishi who can execute a nice uwate-nage, and he was paired against M6 Kinbohzan today. The two hooked up in migi-yotsu from the tachi-ai where Ryuden grabbed a left outer grip and then positioned himself to the right of his opponent. As for Kinbohzan, he made no effort to dig in and just stood there letting Ryuden do what he wanna, and eventually Ryuden wrenched Kinbohzan towards the edge there the foreigner turned his back and said do me now. It took two or three seconds for Ryuden to clue into the fact that Kinbohzan hadn't stepped out, and so Ryuden finally offered a nudge from behind creating a very awkward, mukiryoku ending (sigh). Both rikishi finish the day at 2-3, and this could have been one of the better bouts of the day if both dudes had tried.

M4 Shodai and M2 Midorifuji bear hugged each other from the tachi-ai in hidari-yotsu, and Midorifuji kindly allowed Shodai to body him back. As he did, Midorifuji attempted a haphazard kubi-nage that made Shodai flinch and lose some balance, but Midorifuji was not out for blood, and so he stayed in place so Shodai could square back up and body Midorifuji across and down. Not sure why they ruled this one oshi-dashi...probably because it was fake like most oshi-dashi bouts, but the end result is Shodai moving to 3-2 while Midorifuji falls to 1-4.

M4 Tobizaru stood straight up at the tachi-ai against M1 Atamifuji allowing the latter to come in and grab a firm left outer grip as the two hooked up in migi-yotsu. After settiling in, Atamifuji tested the (dare I say) uwate-nage waters a few times, but the dude did not exhibit good offensive sumo skills his previous two basho in the division, so they're not just going to show up here even against a smaller opponent like Tobizaru who was giving Atamifuji the advantage.

After the failed outer belt throws, the two dug in for what seemed like 30 seconds until Tobizaru finally went for an inside belt throw, which was just an excuse for him to back up to the edge so an extremely tired Atamifuji could push him across that last step, and there you have it...another oshi-dashi win that was nothing of the sorts. Atamifuji buys..er..picks up his first win here at 1-4 while Tobizaru falls to 3-2.

Suckiwake Daieisho knocked M1 Wakamotoharu upright from the tachi-ai, but he wasn't driving with the legs, and so WMH was able to inashi Daieisho with the right hand into the Suckiwake's left side sending Daieisho over to the edge where his back was turned to Wakamotoharu. Instead of bum rushing Daieisho across that last half step, Wakamotoharu let up, and the two hooked up in the hidari-yotsu position. It was comical to watch Daieisho try and grab a right outer with his crocodile arms, but fortunately for him, Wakamotoharu wasn't trying to win and so the latter allowed the flow back to the center of the ring, and when Daieisho went for a mediocre right tsuki-otoshi, Wakamotoharu just flopped to the dirt.

Wakamotoharu "won" the battle between these two last basho, and so I'm sure Daieisho was just calling in the favor as he moves to 4-1. As for Wakamotoharu, looks like he's got a bitta debt to repay as he falls to 2-3.

As mentioned yesterday, Sumo only has three headlines that can keep the fans' interest, which include:

Asanoyama being Asanoyama
Onosato's rookie debut
Kotonowaka's run to Ozeki that nobody is talking about

Today, Suckiwake Kotonowaka was paired against Komusubi Ura, and what a joke of a bout this was. Kotonowaka was wide open at the tachi-ai allowing Ura to burrow in close to moro-zashi and force the Suckiwake back to the edge, but instead of really trying to finish him off, Ura darted out of the prime position and ran around the ring a bit before the two settled back down in the center of the ring where Ura just gave Kotonowaka the right outer grip. Ura wasn't even trying anything with his left, so with the smaller rikishi just standing there, Kotonowaka dashi-nage'd him over and across in uncontested fashion. Hooboy, an Ozeki candidate who needs to buy Ura off. Kotonowaka is an ugly, ugly 5-0 while Ura takes the cash at 1-4.

Ozeki Kirishima and M2 Abi traded tsuppari from the tachi-ai, but you could tell that there was no continuity to the bout. The Ozeki attempted to get the left arm inside and then go for an inashi, but these two weren't close enough together for anything to work, so with Abi darting this way and that, Kirishima went for another half-assed pull that barely made contact, but Abi just carelessly stepped out of the ring for no reason. Well, there was a reason. Abi owed Kirishima a win, and he obviously gave it to him here in about as sloppy a bout of sumo as you'd care to see. Then end result is Kirishima's moving to 4-1 while Abi falls to 0-5.

Ozeki Hoshoryu and M3 Gonoyama hooked up in hidari-yotsu where Hoshoryu just stood straight up gifting Gonoyama the easy peasy right outer grip. Before Gonoyama could even bear down, Hoshoryu just backed up right out of the ring with Gonoyama in tow. What another sloppy bout that was obviously arranged as Hoshoryu suffers his first loss at 4-1 while Gonoyama is gifted 2-3.

In the day's final affair, M3 Hokutofuji was able to knock a passive Yokozuna Terunofuji back a step from the tachi-ai, but the Yokozuna was just playing it safe here. With Hokutofuji moving forward, Terunofuji got the right arm inside and secured his foe around the arm with the left, and from there the Yokozuna forced Hokutofuji across the ring before pushing him out with ease. At least this bout was real as Terunofuji improves to 4-1 with Hokutofuji falling ot 3-2.

With Hoshoryu taking the loss today, that means our only two undefeated rikishi left are...say it isn't so...Kotonowaka and Asanoyama!!  What were the odds??

We'll see what tomorrow brings, but don't expect it to be pretty.

Day 4 Comments (Mike Wesemann reporting)
There's a term in sumo called buttsuke-honban, which refers to a rikishi who enters a hon-basho without having done any keiko, and that's my situation with this basho as I did not read any headlines prior to the basho. After watching the first three days, I've figured out that we've got two rookies in the division, one of which (Onosato) they are hyping hard, but neither of the rookies won legitimately through the first three days. It sounds as if Kirishima is also up for Yokozuna promotion, and so we'll see how that pans out after the Ozeki's easy 3-0 start.

It was also nice to see Terunofuji back in action, and with Terunofuji, Kiribayama, and Hoshoryu all active this basho, it really feels like those three dudes are playing for the big pot in Texas Hold 'Em with all the chips while the Japanese rikishi are fooling around with the side pot and their crumbs.

With that, let's try and catch up on things by reviewing all the Day 4 action. My broadcast started with the announcement that Takakeisho had withdrawn from the basho citing nerve pain at the base of his neck. He supposedly aggravated the area during morning keiko (bet that was fierce) on Day 2, and then it worsened during his bout later that day against Atamifuji. As usual, I've been watching the top three bouts streamed from the previous day, and nobody will miss Takakeisho.

Komusubi Takayasu also withdrew from the basho yesterday due to acute lower back pains. Media reports are saying he also tweaked his back during morning keiko on Day 2, and getting beat up by Kirishima later on that day surely didn't help.

 That means we get to start out with the most anticipated bout on the day, M17 Aoiyama vs. J1 Daiamami. As he's done all basho, Aoiyama stood up at the tachi-ai as if to tsuppari, but he just backed up and outta the ring with Daiamami in tow. What useless sumo to start the day, and with Aoiyama (0-4) checking in at M17, this is how every day this basho has started. Daiamami moves to 2-2, and we'll all be on pins and needles to see if he comes back to Makuuchi for March.

Up next, M16 Takarafuji did nothing from the tachi-ai to get inside against M16 Bushozan, and with Takarafuji upright, it allowed Bushozan to go on the attack. It wasn't much of an attack, and so the two circled around the ring before Takarafuji went for a weak pull stepping out before Bushozan hit the dirt leaving both rikishi at 2-2. Homarefuji, who was in the mukou-joumen chair said after the bout, "I really wanted to see Bushozan to attack harder with the lower stance." Didn't we all, brother. Didn't we all?

Previous to this bout, they interviewed a new Juryo dude, Takerufuji, from the Isegahama-beya, and the sumo they showed from him actually looks legit. It'll take a bit for him to get to Makuuchi, but he looks very promising to me unlike the two current rookies we have in the division in M17 Shimazuumi and M15 Onosato.

I've scrutinized the sumo from both of these dudes the first three days, and both of them have failed to exhibit any attacking skills. Their collective five wins coming in were all fake, and I snapped this pic from the Kotoshoho - Onosato bout from Day 2 because it illustrates so much. Onosato is on the right, and he's upright and way out of position. Kotoshoho is lower in the attacking stance, and he has his right hand resting on the outer belt of the rookie, but he of course never grabbed it. Had he done so, he would have been able to pinch Onosho's left inside arm completely useless and won the bout from there. Instead he fumbled around and set up the loss just like all of their opponents to this point except for Onosho who showed just how easy it is to beat Onosato yesterday.

Anyway, the two rookies were paired up today, and M15 Onosato just steamrolled M17 Shimazuumi back from the starting lines and had him pushed back and across in under two seconds. The key to this bout was Shimazuumi's failed tachi-ai. He was thinking about getting the left inside, but the move was weak and with Onosato moving forward, he cut that off straightway, and so that left Shimazuumi completely upright with his feet aligned.

Onosato showed what should happen when a guy is in the worst of positions possible, so when you see a guy upright with feet aligned and he wins, you know the bout is fake.

I was glad to see Onosato moving forward today, and I think he did so because he knew the bout wasn't arranged, and so he gave a better effort than he has the first three days where he was passive and upright himself. I would have liked to have seen him catch Shimazuumi with a paw to the throat or the chest, but this was like a half yori-kiri half oshi-dashi with no definitive offensive move from the dude. At least he was moving forward, so credit him for that with both of these guys finishing 3-1.

Before we move on, the biggest problem with fixed sumo is it doesn't make guys like Onosato learn the hard way, and so even with a good win today, there wasn't that one two punch. When they use the word "bariki," or horsepower, to describe someone's moves instead of actual thrusts or belt positioning, you know the actual sumo is lacking. We'll of course continue to watch these two moving forward, but Onosato is here to stay. Hailing from the Nishonoseki-beya, he's got plenty of money (not to mention an Ichimon) backing him up, and that's been evident his entire rise to this point.

M13 Churanoumi was wide open at the tachi-ai as he reached for a left frontal grip, but instead of taking advantage of the youngster and getting established inside, M15 Tomokaze instead chose to move left without even going for a pull, and the dude moved to the edge of the ring and just stood straight up waiting for Churanoumi to finally move in and push him out. Churanoumi is a fake 3-1 while Tomokaze is hoarding cash at 0-4.

M14 Onosho's tachi-ai was bad, and it left the dude upright with feet aligned. Instead of taking advantage, M13 Endoh just stood there with his arms pointed forward, but he wasn't trying to thrust into his compromised opponent or grab the belt. Onosho had only one direction to go, which was backwards, and so he retreated to the edge and moved left, and Endoh just played along never trying to push his opponent or get the right inside and force Onosho across at the edge. Oh well. This is just the game we see far too often in sumo as Onosho moves to 3-1 with Endoh falling to 1-3.

M14 Kotoshoho was proactive from the tachi-ai against a listless M12 Myogiryu, but Kotoshoho wasn't executing sound sumo, and so Myogiryu had to pretend to do most of the work here staying busy but never taking advantage of Kotoshoho. It was clear that one dude was trying and the other wasn't, and so in the end, Myogiryu put both hands at the back of Kotoshoho's head as if to pull, and then he just flopped sideways across the edge landing on his fanny with no contact coming from Kotoshoho (3-1). Myogiryu falls to 1-3 after throwing the bout in his opponent's favor.

M12 Takanosho connected with a nice paw to M11 Ohho's face, but then for no reason other than to throw the bout, he turned a bit sideways to his left allowing Ohho to rush in and score the uncontested push-out win. Ohho buys this one in moving to 3-1 while Takanosho falls to 2-2, and I'll stop calling these bouts fake when these guys stop fixing the hell out of them.

M9 Mitakeumi set a new slow speed record with his tachi-ai going for a henka to his left against M11 Tsurugisho, and Tsurugisho's reaction was to just move forward and run himself out of the ring. This was just silly. Mitakeumi was so slow here, anybody who wanted to contest this bout could have at least turned his body towards his foe and looked to square back up, but the fix was in sending Mitakeumi to 3-1 while Tsurugisho falls to 1-3.

In a contested bout, M9 Meisei caught M10 Sadanoumi with thrusts to the upper body and neck from the tachi-ai keeping Sadanoumi upright and taking away any offensive attack from the Sadamight. With Meisei moving forward, Sadanoumi looked to move left and possibly score on an inashi move, but Meisei had all the momentum gained from the tachi-ai, and he was able to push Sadanoumi back before the latter could counter. Very nice win and nice sumo from Meisei who moves to 2-2, and in my criticism of Onosato earlier, I want to see the rookie do what Meisei did from the tachi-ai today. That's the first step to winning legitimately. As for Sadanoumi, he falls to 1-3.

M10 Tamawashi stood upright from the tachi-ai against M8 Hiradoumi and offered some upper body thrusts Hiradoumi's way, but he was just waiting for his opponent to attack. Hiradoumi's answer was a stupid pull that took him back near the edge, but instead of moving forward and knocking Hiradoumi backwards onto his arse, Tamawashi just moved forward with C3P0 arms gifting Hiradoumi moro-zashi, and then as Hiradoumi mounted his weak force-out attack, Tamawashi did nothing to counter just opting to stay upright as he did his part in backing out of the ring. Hiradoumi is a cheap 3-1 while Tamawashi is paid to fall to 2-2.

M7 Asanoyama continues to be the most popular rikishi in sumo for who knows what reason, and today he was paired against M8 Hokuseiho, a rikishi he can actually beat straight up. Hokuseiho exhibited his usual lazy tachi-ai where he stands straight up, and Asanoyama took full advantage rushing forward and getting the right arm inside coupled with the left outer grip. Asanoyama immediately forced Hokuseiho back, but the youngster had a firm right outer grip that he could have used to counter.

Unfortunately, he didn't even try, and he just stood there as Asanoyama eventually got the big dude forced back, over and out, and this was a good win for Asanoyama because the sumo was sound, but Hokuseiho did not make it difficult on his opponent. I mean, the dude is lazy as hell, but anybody who wants to win a bout of sumo would have countered with that right inside belt position. The end result is Asanoyama's skating to 4-0 with Hokuseiho dutifully falling to 1-3.

M7 Ichiyamamoto was quick out of the gate coming with his usual tsuppari attack that didn't have much of a punch, and M5 Ryuden was quite nonchalant from the start allowing himself to get backed up near the edge, and from there IYM went for a swipe downwards against Ryuden's torso giving Ichiyamamoto the excuse to back up to the other side of the dohyo, and as Ryuden advanced still trying to wake the hell up, Ichiyamamoto slipped and just plopped to the dirt. Looks like these two were just trading wins (Ryuden let IYM win last basho) as Ryuden moves to 1-3 with Ichiyamamoto falling to 0-4. Remember, Ichiyamamoto has been in the yusho hunt the last two basho, so there's a lot of favors the dude has to return...thus to 0-4 start.

M5 Nishikigi got the left arm firmly inside at the tachi-ai against M6 Shonannoumi, and NG plowed forward from there locking Shonannoumi's own left arm in tight rendering it useless, and with Nishikigi going for the do-or-die, force out, Shonannoumi attempted a counter tsuki with the right that was a day late and a dollar short. Nishikigi cruises to 3-1 with the nice win while Shonannoumi is 1-3.

M4 Tobizaru exhibited the worst tachi-ai up to this point by backing up and moving a bit to his left without even going for a pull, and M6 Kinbohzan just played along moving forward and then raising his arms as high as possible gifting Tobizaru moro-zashi. From there as Tobizaru mounted a force-out attack, Kinbohzan just turned around 180 degrees and ran outta the dohyo faster than Tobizaru forced him out. What a farce this was in an obviously fixed bout that saw Tobizaru move to an ill-gotten 3-1 while Kinbohzan quietly falls to 2-2.

M2 Abi looked to gift his bout to M3 Hokutofuji from the tachi-ai purposefully coming in high and whiffing on his initial thrust attack before going into pull mode where he wasn't actually pulling. Hokutofuji was ill-prepared, however, and so this bout took an awkward turn where Abi was doing all the movement and work while Hokutofuji just stood there without a pot to piss in. You knew Abi was trying to throw it, but with Hokutofuji doing nothing, it was gonna take something like a tsuki-hiza to end it, and that's exactly what we got. They ruled it tsuki-otoshi in favor of Hokutofuji, but there was no blow that came from Hokutofuji that would have caused Abi (0-4) to put his knee down wildly like that. It's just another case of fixed sumo as Hokutofuji buys his way to 3-1.

Prior to Suckiwake Kotonowaka's match they showed a graphic of his results the past year, and the dude is coming into the basho with 20 wins. He didn't make-koshi once the past year and the reason of course is that he's been buying bouts hand over fist, but it just feels like he's destined to become the next Japanese Ozeki. He's got enough money backing him, so it's likely just a matter of time.

Today against M1 Atamifuji, the tachi-ai was uneventful as Kotonowaka got the right arm inside with Atamifuji doing nothing but standing there like a bump on a log. After about four seconds of inaction, Kotonowaka slipped right going for a mediocre kata-sukashi, and that was Atamifuji's cue to just put his palms to the dirt with no other part of his body touching down. Who knows who would win in a straight up bout between these two because we didn't get one today. Kotonowaka moves to a bought-and-paid-for 4-0 while Atamifuji falls to 0-4, and how nice will it be not to have Atamifuji in the yusho race this basho? Oh, but that egao!!

Suckiwake Daieisho caught M4 Shodai nicely from the tachi-ai going on offense from the start as he thrust Shodai around the ring this way and that. Shodai stood his ground fairly well and looked to get an arm inside to counter, but it wouldn't come to fruition as Daieisho eventually knocked Shodai over and out with a nice oshi attack where he never went for a pull. Daieisho moves to 3-1 with the nice sumo while Shodai falls to 2-2.

At this point they announced Takakeisho's kyujo, and it sounded like most of the fans in the arena weren't aware of it drawing noticeable groans. The result is Komusubi Ura's picking up his first win at 1-3 while Takakeisho falls to 2-2 and will finish the basho 2-13.

M1 Wakamotoharu came with a kachi-age against Ozeki Hoshoryu and then quickly morphed that into an effective nodowa with the right, but since WMH didn't win the tachi-ai, the Ozeki was able to fight off the choke hold and get the left arm inside. Wakamotoharu pressed with the body from there forcing the action near the edge, but it was Hoshoryu who turned the tables using a nice tsuki with the left into the back of Wakamotoharu's shoulder turning him around at the ropes where the Ozeki then dumped him out okuri-nage style. I really enjoyed seeing Wakamotoharu (2-2) fight when it counted but he just came up short as Hoshoryu stays perfect at 4-0.

Ozeki Kirishima looked to catch M2 Midorifuji with a moro-te-zuki, but he purposefully let his hand slip upwards gifting Midorifuji moro-zashi. Midorifuji's reach is so short, the moro-zashi had no effect, and as the two wrangled, Kirishima found himself with the right arm back inside, but he quickly repented and brought it back to the outside re-gifting Midori-chan moro-zashi. From that point, Kirishima just stood there, and you knew he was waiting to react to the kata-sukashi move, and Midorifuji finally executed a short scoop throw and then offered a quick slap form there, and Kirishima was more than willing to plop to the dirt. Midorifuji is gifted his first win at 1-3 while Kirishima falls willingly to 3-1.

Regarding Kirishima's consideration for Yokozuna, the sad thing is that there's no suspense. If he wanted to go 13-2 or 14-1 he could. If he wants to throw enough bouts to take himself out of contention, he can and will. Where's the suspense in that? My feeling is with Takakeisho's withdrawal and no other Japanese Ozeki, Kirishima will refrain. He couldn't wait to drop today...that's for sure.

In the day's final bout, Yokozuna Terunofuji welcomed M3 Gonoyama by wrapping up Gonoyama's right arm and pulling him into a left outer grip, and before Gonoyama knew what hit him, Terunofuji had him thrown over and down uwate-nage style. Terunofuji moves to 3-1 with the emphatic win while Gonoyama falls to 1-3.

Four day's in and this is what Japan's got going for it in terms of keeping the fans interested:

Asanoyama is 4-0
Onosato is 3-1
Kotonowaka is 4-0

Those are the three storylines that they really care about in order of interest. The yusho race is inconsequential if it doesn't include any of those three rikishi nor does anyone care about Kirishima's Yokozuna talk.

It's been a nice layoff and as long as the Australian Open doesn't distract me too much, I'll be back every day the rest of the tournament.