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Day 13: (This better be appreciated..)

Day 1:

It's going to be a stormy ride this basho. I moved to where the Internet is slow, so the uploads will be slow. I have a lot going on right now for a change so many days will be late. I'm leaving for Ko Samui (is it cold there?) next Thursday so the last four days will probably not be uploaded unless I really go nuts, which I may.. in any case, I will gambarize and do my best, facing one day at a time, hopefully being able to do my kind of uploading. Thank you.

Final Day Hatsu 2016- it's been a hectic few days - doing this during my holiday was bad enough without dealing with all the small and bitter people who don't really like sumo. We'll get over it-they won't.

Yes, we're back to the low-fi again!!

Hiya. There have frequently been discussions (here and elsewhere) about the strength and/or dominance of Yokozuna. Is Hakuho just the best ever, or is he just lucky to have a bunch of mediocre rikishi around him? A couple of days ago I realized that I have the data to address some of these questions. It was quite an epic undertaking, with 20+ hours of work going into it. I had all the data available, but they were distributed over hundreds of files, and took a while to extract. Anyway, here is what I did. A couple of years ago, I began collecting Elo ratings for all SumoDB bouts since 1934. Elo ratings can be quite fickle: it is harder, though not impossible, to achieve high ratings with less bouts in a basho, less basho in a year, and less rikishi on the banzuke. Therefore my analyses began with all Yokozuna since the advent of the 6-basho era. I took the Elo ratings of all their bouts during their respective Yokozuna tenures. Moreover, in order to address the issue of dominance, I also recorded the Elo ratings of all their opponents. This allowed me to compute average Elo ratings for each basho of a Yokozuna, and, if the Yokozuna weren't kyujo, the average Elo ratings of their opponents for each basho. I will present the data in four charts. YOKOZUNA STRENGTH The first chart shows the Elo ratings of Yokozuna during their Yokozuna careers (click to enlarge). Some observations: There are rikishi who made Yokozuna while still improving, thus giving us something like a bell curve for their careers (Taiho and Kitanoumi are good examples). Other Yokozuna probably "fluked" into their promotion as a career highlight, and went downward from there on (Asashio, Tochinoumi, Kotozakura, Mienoumi, Takanosato, Asahifuji, Wakanohana; potentially also Harumafuji and Kakuryu). As can be seen from the overall gestalt of the graph, Yokozuna from the 1960s onward were much stronger than the first two on the list (for instance, at the end of his career Asashio had an Elo rating of about 2080. To put this into perspective, that is the current level of a guy like Sadanoumi on the current banzuke). Starting with Asashoryu, ratings went through the roof, a potential effect of the internationalization of sumo. Asashoryu bested age-old Elo ratings of Taiho, and Hakuho simply annihilated Asashoryu's records. The highest moment-to-moment rating of Hakuho was incredible 2690 points during Natsu 2011. Even Harumafuji and Kakuryu are not much weaker than Chiyonofuji, according to these data! Consequently, one could say that the most unfortunate Yokozuna of all time is Harumafuji - better than most on the list, but still a perennial also-ran There has also been talk about great rivalries recently. And the classic candidates show nicely on this graph: Kashiwado was second fiddle to Taiho for about five years, but then his rivalry (but not his career) ended. Wajima/Kitanoumi were also a nice couple, spiced up later by guys like Wakanohana and Mienoumi. Akebono/Takanohana was also a great matchup, specifically as the Japanese had the upper hand from 1994 to 1997, but Akebono was slightly better after that. It would be interesting to see what would have happened if Tamanoumi didn't die aged 27. He was about to potentially become a rikishi with incredible dominance. Wajima and Takanohana have very interesting curves with a very notable dip, followed by a comeback to former glory. Nice to see how Chiyonofuji became better and better during his tenure. I also had not known that Akebono had to finish his career while being on his highest rating ever! OPPONENT STRENGTH Now onto the second graph, charting the average Elo ratings of the Yokozuna's opponents. Some notes: There are some zigzag patterns with a particularly low opponent rating. This typically happens when a Yokozuna went kyujo after few days, having faced only low-rankers thus far. Once again, we can see two boosts in average opponent strength. One steady improvement from 1958 to 1965. And the internationalization effect kicking in since the Akebono tenure. On average, Yokozuna opponents have never been as strong as in the last few years! This puts the talk about mediocrity among current rikishi into some perspective, hopefully. On a final note, one can nicely see the Futagoyama effect in the mid-1990s. Akebono had a much, much tougher schedule than Takanohana. YOKOZUNA DOMINANCE Now onto the dominance patterns. I computed this graph by looking at the average difference between a Yokozuna during a basho and his opponents during the same basho. Here are the data: First, we can see that there is no general trend. Throughout modern history, the average difference between a Yokozuna and his opponents was between 150 and 300 rating points. Of course, there are some phases of incredible Yokozuna dominance. The first mention goes to Taiho who had very weak opposition during the second half of the 1960s. At the end of the 1970s, Kitanoumi was without serious opposition for some years. The late 1980s saw incredible dominance by Chiyonofuji, though not quite on Taiho levels. It appears that Takanohana was very dominant in the late 1990s, but keep in his mind that his opponents were in fact much weaker than Akebono's due to Futagoyama-beya's overall dominance. Asashoryu was without serious rival until Hakuho began an era of unprecedented dominance, even surpassing Taiho levels. What does that mean with regard to Hakuho? On the one hand, he is the best ever by pure Elo rating levels. On the other hand, his opponents are no muppets, and many of them have the strength of former Yokozuna (Kisenosato and Terunofuji come to mind with Elo ratings of more than 2300 points). On the third hand, however :-), Hakuho has no trouble coping with the better opponent levels, easily playing in a league of his own, dominance-wise. THE BOTTOM LINE On a final note: here is a graph for those people who find the upper graphs to wiggly. It shows the average career Elo rating of each modern Yokozuna during their tenure, and the average Elo rating of all their respective opponents. This graph is somewhat difficult to interpret, as some Yokozuna prolonged their careers to their bitter ends, while others miss the downward spiral due to injuries, death, or the benefit of still being active. In terms of average Elo ratings, Hakuho is numero uno, with Asashoryu a very distant second. Harumafuji and Kakuryu are currently in third and fourth place, but this might change (probably not upwards...). Among retired rikishi, Taiho, Tamanoumi, and Chiyonofuji also stick out. Kakuryu, Harumafuji, and Hakuho are the top three when it comes to opponent strength, another indicator that sumo might be much more high-profile right now than in ages past. As for the biggest difference between Yokozuna and their opponents, Hakuho easily leads, with Taiho and Chiyonofuji being far behind in second and third, respectively. Any comments on that?

I'm as happy as can be. Yusho for Kakuryu and next Yokozuna. I support him for 8 1/2 years now and never ever had any doubts that he would make it one day - and I think I was the only one in this forum and other ones. And to all those who think he doesnt deserve it or he will be a mediocre Yokozuna, just wait and see. And yippieh ... I'm in the Yusho picture :-).

12-year-old Sawai Gotaro (Goeido) performing the Yokozuna dohyo-iri at elementary school Sawai of Saitama Sakae High School (Goeido) defeating Kageyama of Meitoku Gijuku (Tochiozan) at senior high school nationals September 2004. Shindeshi with Sakaigawa Oyakata January 2005 Weigh-in Makushita ranked December 2005 Is Juryo promotion announcement September 2006 New shikona Goeido First makuuchi basho September 2007 defeating Takekaze on the way to an excellent 11-4 and kanto-sho Ah, so he used to smile. I had forgotten that. Fighting in the joi jin for the first time, Goeido defeats Ozeki Kotomitsuki, January 2008 Komusubi promotion announcement October 2008 "Borrowing the chest" of Ozeki Chiyotaikai November 2008 Defeating Ozeki Kaio January 2009 on the way to a score of 10-5 and the gino-sho Defeating Sekiwake Baruto on his way to his first kachi-koshi as a komusubi March 2009 Announcement of sekiwake promotion April 2009 Sakaigawa Oyakata answering questions about the involvement of Goeido in the baseball gambling scandal. Goeido under house arrest performing disciplinary menial tasks Handing in his mobile phone to Sewanin Yuho at the entrance to the Kokugikan in the wake of the mobile yaocho scandal May 2011. Defeating Yokozuna Hakuho for the first time May 2012 Defeating Ozeki Kotooshu July 2012 Keiko July 2013 Playing paper Sumo against a little boy prior to the Osaka Basho 2013 Shiko training October 2013 Assisting an infant in a Yokozuna dohyo-iri in a ritual to pray for health. (Over to the experts) Following announcement of ozeki promotion July 2014 Ceremony of acceptance of ozeki promotion July 2014 Defeating Ozeki Kotoshogiku January 2015 Promoting traffic safety as police chief for the day Defeating Ozeki Terunofuji July 2015 November 2015 Defeated by Ichinojo November 2015 following torinaoshi Pre-bout preparation September 2016, Day 9 Arriving in the hanamichi for his day 12 bout against Yokozuna Kakuryu First makuuchi yusho September 2016

Sorry for the very lousy quality.. Day 1:

Don't worry about me. I'll be fine. I've prepared for this day since my first upload. I'm surprised they took this long to shut me down. Bringing sumo to all you wonderful people was a LARGE portion of my life. I loved every minute of it and I regret nothing. If anything, maybe this is the straw that breaks the camel's back, and hopefully the sumo community will rally. What I hope people will get out of my work is the capability of what one person can achieve. I'm just a normal guy who did something no one else tried. Anyways, aloha everyone and take care!

Senshuraku Aki 2015- thanks for watching!!

Senshuraku- Thanks for watching and for the great feedback - it was a pleasure doing these since about nakabi. Before that-nightmare. Please support. an announcement will follow shortly..

Just returned from Mongolia, had to shorten my trip on the countryside cause we got an invitation to Hakuho's event, a little Naadam (pictures later) and met Asashoryu by accident, very funny, very friendly. He even ordered a kiss ... well in this case it was a pleasure ;)

Final day- thanks for watching but all this retirement stuff and major changes in my life are making me rethink my priorities in life.. Anyhow, I thoroughly enjoyed doing this basho although material is not lying around any more -the challenge made it all the more fun. I added some stuff today that I don't usually add, like full frontal nudity of myself eating chanko and chanting words of encouragement to the universe.

Day 1- the extra low-fi coverage. Don't watch it full screen if you are a stickler for being anal. if you watch it on a third of the screen it looks fairly OK..

Day 1-tomorrow will be very late. sorry.

Day 14:

Day 13:

Day 11:

Promo!!

Day 5:

Day 3:

Day 2- late, lousy quality, I'm thrilled.