Sokkenaiyama

Kafka has nothing on you. He never had.

Thank you, gentlemen. It’s nice to be remembered.

Is there any way to see Naya's bouts from Jonokuchi? I confess I haven't done any extensive searching, but the usual places don't seem to have anything available.

I guess your mind is made up, then. No point in continuing to argue logically. Yes, of course there are some people who believe he is out to destroy the universe (yourself included), and of course his lawyer would have to reply to those accusations with a firm "No" when asked about it, but that doesn't prove a damn thing.

His camp stated the opposite. Since you're so good at reading his mind, could you tell me exactly what he would have to gain from state support vanishing?

It seems Simon is taking over the sumo gaming world in its entirety, not just the rankings. Well played, old man.

Please, indicate the paragraph where Takanohana says the NSK doesn't deserve state sponsorship. Again, you don't seem to even try to put any objectivity into your analysis. I read the "whole thing" from daily.co.jp and there's still no trace of putting the legitimacy of the state-sponsored corporation status under question - the only things Takanohana is asking for is a re-evaluation of the impartiality of his demotion and an investigation into the quality of the management of the NSK. If you were to speculate on Takanohana's endgame, taking over as manager instead of the current bunch is much more in line with his actions so far. Destroying the NSK's state support is definitely something nobody in the sumo world would benefit from. And I personally don't think there's any conceivable way the status could be revoked just based on the recent scandals. As for the "may result in a revocation" conclusion, that's just a vaguely worded catchphrase of a two-paragraph article to increase clickability - the revocation is mentioned at the bottom as a worst-case scenario (which there is little reason to believe will ever even come into consideration). Still, that didn't stop you from presenting it as Takanohana's clearly-stated ultimate goal.

Seconded. My Japanese is still limited, but from what I can decipher, he's asking for a re-examination of the fairness of his demotion and corrective action for the NSK's poor management as a state-sponsored corporation. That's nowhere near anything like demanding the revocation of the NSK's status (which would be ludicrous, even by Takanohana's lofty standards of outlandishness). @Akinomaki, I understand you don't like the guy, but at least try to maintain an appearance of objectivity.

Being present in the two paragraphs above the third. /mustbefunatparties

Pleasure's mine. It was especially ironic and satisfying to see Fujesus at the time try to be as funny as you were, but fall flat on his face. Also, I saw what you did there with Satani.

http://benchsumo.sumogames.de/Results.aspx?B=125&D=7 I did it for you, Fujesus (results and comments are public - you don't even have to login). Be sure to check the whole basho to see how it's done. Also, shouldn't this be in the Off topic section by now?

It's simple, like Takanohana for his results as a rikishi and for his idea(l)s as an oyakata and a member of the NSK - not for the way he implements them.

Don't know if it was on purpose, but it's funny as hell.

It would seem so, wouldn't it. Well, I guess it makes things less complicated.

And now that Aqua lost, Tochihiryu can stay in Juryo with a 6-9 from J12w. He's seventh (!) in line for demotion. I wonder whom he gets to face on day 15. What's more interesting for me is how they treat Takanoiwa's 0-0-15 from J3, given, 1) the already biblical proportions of the demotion-worthy record flood, and 2) the Harumafuji scandal. I had a casual look at how they treat 0-15's from J3 in recent times, and the most recent case of one staying in Juryo (excluding kosho) is from 1970. We may well end up with eight demotions, in which case it would be interesting to see who it is they bring up from makushita.

It's exactly this kind of mindset and the associated pressure that separates the worthy from the eternal contenders. I'm not saying Tochinoshin will drop the ball, but he only has to do it once for Kakuryu to instantly become the favorite again. Also, there are enough tricky opponents left for the last two days - Endo, surely enough, or the likes of Shohozan or Chiyoshoma, not exactly Yokozuna material, but swift, agile and skilled enough to decisively exploit the tiniest pressure-induced hesitation. The tall Eastern Europe guy that is also me, though, is hoping he won't choke.

It's beyond my limited comprehension why you would not eat and drink for such a long time and not see a doctor, and, most importantly, why you feel the need to let the forum know about it before/instead of going to said doctor. Seriously, though, I always knew you were a bit of an attention whore, but this... this is taking it to a whole new level. Still more mysterious is how you managed to survive for 5 whole days without hydration.

Eludes, you mean. But even so, all of those are against his contemporaries only. I would like to see an all-time ranking as well, but unless time travel is invented, there's no reliable way to come up with one. Heck, one could even argue that Hakuho partly owes his yusho count and career wins to longevity, which could be attributed to advancements in medical science, which is definitely different now from what it was 20, 50, or 100 years ago. Can you say with any degree of certainty that Hakuho would have 40 yusho if his career started in, say, 1988 instead of 2001?

How do you compute GOAT-ness? I've heard this discussion a million times, and there's never a conclusion. Aside from performance against his contemporaries, there isn't much data to go on.

On second thought, though, I think the Yokozunae plural does make a lot of sense in Japanese, if you consider the following kanji, 横綱彙, and consider that the Latin pronunciation rhymes with ない and not with ね. It's scary sometimes what people can come up with at 1:30 AM in the morning, when the Sandman just won't enter.

I said I wasn't a fan. I didn't say I wanted to make myself universally understood. Also, you can read Japanese better than 99.9% of the non-Japanese on this forum.

I used to be a fan of Kotooshu, but now I'm past the fandom phase of my enjoyment of sumo. I would, however, like to see a trans-temporal Super-Sekitori banzuke made up of the 70-something Yokozuna達 (sorry, Mr. D, not a fan of the Latin plural), with the pecking order established by a massive fully-meshed round-robin tournament with the rikishi at their respective primes. So, in no particular (or fathomable, for that matter) order, Hakuho, Asashoryu, Takanohana, Akebono, Musashimaru, Chiyonofuji, Kitanoumi, Wajima, Futabayama, etc. Or, even better, add all the Ozeki to the mix and you also get a Meta-Makushita division as a bonus. Maybe the more numerically inclined members of the forum could pull out their miraculous ELO rating calculators and attempt a quick-and-dirty "ORDER BY"?

I'm as much a kimarite freak as the next sumo otaku, but I don't really know what those are. It's easy to make an educated guess, though. Ushirohikimawashi would be anything that wins you the bout by pulling on the opponent's mawashi when he got behind you. Dashinage was probably refined into uwate- and shitatedashinage; there's also the chance, and it would make a lot of sense, that the unfinished throws we sometimes see today, which don't outright fell the other guy to the ground, but take him off balance just enough to be taken out, were called dashinage in the past. No idea about yagara, but haraidashi could be sweeping an opponent's leg(s) just enough to make him step out. In any case, kimarite naming, either creating classes or applying those classifications to real instances of winning techniques, is far from an exact science, it's more of an art form. Many, many times, the bout is won through a succession of strategies, tactics and a sequence of attempted moves, so much that the single kimarite at the end is irrelevant or even detracts from the overall impression. Other times, the finishing kimarite is an overlap of two or more finishing moves, either because they involve very similar stances/actions, like oshidashi and tsukidashi, or that thing Harumafuji did which could be seen as kotenage, tottari or hikkake, but which was nearly impossible to classify because of the low stance and the aggressive flow of the bout, or because one is a natural consequence from the other one not being properly executed or finished, e.g. a dashinage degenerating into okuridashi/taoshi, sukuinage into tsukiotoshi, etc. Philosophy aside, though, I would also like to see some books of old with "formal" descriptions for the obsolete techniques. I would also be interested in seeing some "official" explanations for their obsolescence (I'm not really holding my breath, but hey, maybe, just maybe...)

I never left, you know. Doesn't the rank say "Stalker"?

You're mistaking this place for a democracy, mister.