dada78641

Brief news article in English: https://www.hawaiinewsnow.com/2024/04/11/akebono-giant-sumo-world-proud-hawaiian-dies-54/

That's incredibly sad, to pass away at only 54. He was active before I started watching sumo, but I've still seen a lot of his bouts on Youtube and he was truly a magnificent wrestler in a magnificent era. I was still really holding out hope that he'd be able to somehow recover from landing in a wheelchair through physical therapy, but it wasn't to be.

Not a good start to the basho for my favorites, Hokutofuji and Kirishima, both going 0-4. On the plus side, I've actually been watching it live despite not being in Japan, since I've been so jetlagged my sleeping schedule got reset to where I wake up at 6 am.

Yeah, it's a truly incredible situation and I honestly can't imagine that this is the ideal outcome for the victims of bullying. The end result is much too disruptive, to the point where future victims simply would not want to come forward and everybody involved is strongly motivated to solve things quietly and internally rather than through the proper channels. Which, of course, is not going to solve the problem, and will lead to the next Hokuseiho with a gigantic CV of abuse because it isn't stopped. To me this solution feels like it's designed to make the NSK's life easier, not the lives of abused wrestlers.

Guys, please, a hostess club is not a whore house. There's no prostitution taking place there even secretly. It's honestly just pretty girls who pour your drink and chat with you, nothing more.

I'm conflicted on whether it was wiping a tear or a canceled facepalm.

Just seeing a big report on the news about the incident. Video of Hakuho and Hokuseiho apologizing in front of the cameras, Hakuho saying "I failed to protect my disciples and I accept responsibility." Can't quite find a video of it yet but I'm sure it'll get posted soon. It's big mainstream news here and one can imagine how much this damages Hakuho's reputation as stablemaster from here on out. Whatever plans he had for changing the NSK or sumo, I think he can pretty much forget about them.

Considering how numerous the types of abuse are, it really feels like there's no possibility Hakuho didn't know what was going on. You can't exactly pretend it's nothing when there's this much and it's this bizarre. Like others have said it's all just so disappointing. I really wasn't expecting Hokuseiho to be this kind of person, and I wasn't expecting Hakuho to be so lackadaisical about protecting his new heya that he allowed all this to happen.

Is there even the slightest chance that Hakuoho doesn't get the fighting spirit prize? What a boss. He's destined for greatness.

I'm glad Hokutofuji is doing well this basho. I've been a huge fan of his sumo since his initial makuuchi successes that had people singing his praises, but he's generally had a rough time. I hope this is not just one exceptionally good basho, but more a sign that he's fixed the issues that held him back in the past.

I don't know if there's a better place to put this (let me know if so) but if anyone wanted to see the first Ukrainian juryo wrestler's 新十両 interview, from day 3, I made a copy of it here.

Extremely impressive by Tobizaru to keep standing after all those charges by the yokozuna, even if he's clearly not fighting at full strength. If his mawashi had been slightly more tight I think he would've lost that bout, though.

Looks like Terunofuji found a new training partner. Terunofuji vs Nagoya governor Oumura:

I made this screenshot a couple of days ago (not sure when, maybe a week ago) and forgot to post, but... If you ever feel bad about not remembering the kanji for people's shikona, don't feel bad, even NHK gets it wrong sometimes!

Yeah, I'm actually feeling positive about Asanoyama given how he's had a rough time clawing his way back to where he was before. And by that I mean he hasn't had his usual level of training opportunities. I would expect him to slide backwards a little bit because of something like that but he seems to have maintained his previous level of skill pretty well.