Tsuchinoninjin

To add to everything many of the current successful Japanese rikishi start in elementary school. The Mongolians are transferring to Japanese schools earlier and earlier. There's nothing wrong with getting involved with US amateur sumo and enjoying working out and matches in the sumo way through them. I am sure any sumo club in the US would love someone who shows up often. I took my first job only in a city that I knew had a strong baduk club, which was essentially just a hobby, and I had many hours of enjoyment just through that. The US clubs supported the strong club members in sending them to pro-level tournaments in Asia, and US baduk is just on slightly better footing than US sumo.

I think its probably going to go easier the other way NFL -> sumo. Having been around both rikishi and players, the offensive linemen are just so much bigger. One guy's forearm was bigger than my thigh. They are just monsters. Probably running backs might make the jump too, but the DLs already have tons of experience with belt grip and holding the OLs back The long shot is getting one of those guys to accept sumo culture and everything. The min salary for NFL players is definitely higher than makuuchi average but also a lot of those guys don't make it more than 2 years.

The amount of outside perks really can't be understated. I think I remember a story of a rikishi who had just gotten into makuuchi getting gifted a mercedes benz from a supporter, when driving wasn't so taboo. If a rank and file guy gets that, the imagination wonders what Hakuho might be receiving. And I don't think those will slow down if he opens a heya. Hell, he'll probably get more.

Shodai's four letter saying is 至誠一貫 (shisei ikkan) According to yojikabe website this means: "To penetrate sincerity to the very end, be extremely sincere. Through a single policy, method, attitude, passing through from the beginning to the end. To confront everything with a heart. " Here's a phone background if you really want to get into it:

It’s quite a long story spread over several older threads here (some eaten by the software) but Takagenji and his twin were in Takanohanas stable. Takanohana was in the middle of trying to seriously disrupt the old guard in the kyokai on the heels of Harumafuji attacking Takanoiwa (his other Deshi ). He had a lot of outside support and one of his main talking points was eliminating behind the scenes violence and being more open about heya happenings. However it came out that Takagenji and his twin were hazing and being really not nice to other heyamates. This caused Takanohanas efforts to implode and he retired from the kyokai. I think some additional stuff happened with Takanoiwa too. After that Takagenji s twin beat people a couple of times (getting chances to correct his behavior) and was essentially expelled but not before hiring a lawyer and threatening to sue for reinstatement. So Takagenji was left by himself and fell pretty hard down the banzuke after all this stuff with his twin. Many people just think it’s a matter of time before he gets involved with something again as well. i guess the silver lining of COVID happening has swept this sour story out of our recent memory.

Yeah, none of the people I know are famous, and I think pick up dual citizenship when they are born in the US but added to their Japanese family register - and then it just slips under the radar at 20 years old. Though in one case it did end up with a bunch of back US taxes for one guy.

The last time I looked deeply into this is that as long as you can prove a past and future income of $100k+ USD per year it is relatively easy to fast track citizenship in Japan. I think this part Kakuryu is not too worried about. Indeed, we have many people in our company that enter Japan on a Japanese passport and the US on an American passport...

Congrats Shodai!

Really weird how it was averaging about 1 per decade then 2013 showed up. Maybe due to the drought of youngsters entering?

I'm putting this here because people talked about it. A rare thing happen after the Mitakeiumi - Takanosho match, Futagoyama oyakata (moto miyabiyama) stood up and left. "Looks like he had to go to the bathroom" reported the NHK sumo commentator. "He mentioned he had stomach pain. It was difficult to sit there for him. He couldn't endure the pain and went to the toilet." explained head judge Isegahama oyakata. "His face turned a bad color, and started sweating" added Futagoyama's own deshi. Futagoyama Oyakata races from the bathroom.

1. Kotoshoho KK 2. Terunofuji KK 3. Suzuki KK 4. Amakaze MK 5. Tokisakae MK 6. Kitanowaka MK 7. Yoshii KK 8. Asanoyama 13-2 9. Murata KK 10. Kaishin MK 11. Shodai 10-5 12. Terutsuyoshi MK 13. Tobizaru KK TB 12

Asanoyama clearly has ozeki staying power whether or not the current yokozuna attend a basho. He's probably number one on everyone's list of next yokozuna at this point too. I really wonder about Takakeisho. He became Ozeki in a very strange time. It might have been better for his long term career if he hadn't made Ozeki so young. If Shodai's step up from the last two basho is real and mitakeumi continues to gather it together, Takakeisho is in a bind.

I don't think the Hawaiian government has any sway over Japan letting in tourists from the US. The Japanese company I work for isn't even planning high level exec travel to Japan from US until 2021. We still have all of our non-Japanese who live and work in Japan but doing short visit to US (Taiwanese, Vietnamese, Americans) still stuck in the US. I guess I don't know what type of passport you hold, but wish you good luck anyway.

Helper is updated: http://sumoninjin.droppages.com/sumoHBcustom.html

A weird one but: A basho of thirds? The number of maegashira taking a 10-5 or 5-10 record was 2 more than any other basho. Including Juryo rikishi, it is still the leader, having 1 more than any other basho. 2nd place was in the 50s, which had 19 more maegashira+juryo on the banzuke than now.

The 12 person meeting in Japan is now cancelled as 3 have the virus. Since the 3 are in the same bu, if they all stay home no work would get done, so one continues to come in. Also my coworker in NYC has passed. She was super intelligent, a lot of contribution to the literature in her field. Not even 50 yet... Middle school kids...

I mean come on, I just got off a call 3 hours ago and they're still shoulder to shoulder in the meeting room. 12 people, many older men with a history of heavy smoking. They're all wearing masks now but they all pull them down when their glasses steam up. In an office building where two cases were identified Monday. You don't have to 'ramp up' social distancing like testing capability. It can be done overnight.

Yes, blame all on us which tried to get the message out after you wouldn't believe us. And that is a royal 'us'. There were many doctors and health experts warning about this for a very long time. Yes, other countries also failed. I am also unhappy about that. I completely disagree that limited testing isn't an intentional strategy. There is no 'accidental' strategy at a national level. If the government is just winging it then it is unacceptable. You posted this a while ago how we were too alarmist: If Japan had actually restricted movement then, we wouldn't have had the current situation in Japan. Sorry, but if you think the Japanese government is infallible and couldn't have gotten things going and the problem is people worrying too much, that's idiotic. Too many people have this opinion and allows the government to get complacent. The fact is almost every country has more testing capability than Japan other than places with extreme poverty. It is very simple, this is worse than flu because NOBODY has immunity, so it spread really easily. It was very obvious to us who had a window into the early outbreak areas. But instead we got shit on for trying to show how bad it was going to be. You were wrong, so now you just shit on us because we're told we are too stupid to understand anything. We're not experts. We can't understand medical literature. It is even more frustrating because the initial people who tried to get the word out have paid dearly for it. And nobody gave a shit and belittled others. It must feel so care free not to have to worry about this.

As I said before, the one guy in our Japan office had to have a fever for 5 days before they allowed his test... and a lot of people don't have a fever for that long with this virus. The numbers are much larger than they appear. In NYC they are finding the virus in people's lungs who come into the hospital for completely unrelated reasons such as broken ribs etc. Here they have started building field hospitals in all the sports stadiums and convention centers.

Are you kidding? We're gonna shoot off our guns in sync with the tachi-ai

Mainland tourists are only in the mainland tourist areas though. Really strange.

The people in our office that tested positive had a fever for 5 days before they were allowed to take the test.

It's probably coming. Seems like keeping the Olympics was the roadblock. Heard the markets got ransacked yesterday from colleagues.

The guys at HQ were kicking and screaming when were trying to get approval to shut down the factories here. I could go on about the specifics but its clear they still don't get it or believe it. It is just really disappointing. Two months out from now -- who knows what everything is going to be like. Maybe the sun will come out and destroy it???

For some reason the first burst had like a week delay of appearing in the statistics, the second burst has appeared almost immediately. I think Japan has a very fractured medical system where tons of small independent private systems exist. It may contribute to that. They staggered the lunches in office now but people still gather shoulder to shoulder in the tiny meeting rooms. Maybe the govt sees this as their chance to catch up in the global economy. Keep factories open while the world closes, at the same time the aging problem there kind of solves itself. It sounds horrific and unthinkable but the Lt Gov of Texas publicly recommended such a thing yesterday... So no doubt that kind of thing is discussed closed doors among some diet members. Sacrifice of the few for the good of many is a super popular movie theme in Japan, wonder if they still agree with that in real life.