Best deshi and rikishi of Hatsu 2009

[Azumashida 1]

I started these polls about best deshi and rikishi of the basho in different categories after Aki 2008. The three categories here are "teenager" (less than 20 years old), "young rikishi" (less than 24) and "ex-university" (any rikishi with university sumo experience). Similar to the sansho, I've limited the nominations to rikishi below ozeki. Go here for the results from last basho.

Feel free to take a couple of minutes and cast your votes on who had the best performance of the Kyushu basho 2008 in each category.

And feedback on what doesn't quite work / what could be improved is welcome of course!

[Asashosakari 20,251]

Hmm, I wanted to vote for Kotoenomoto. (Sign of approval...)

[Azumashida 1]

Hmm, I wanted to vote for Kotoenomoto. (Sign of approval...)

Maybe I should have a more variable amount of nominations depending on how many great performances there are instead of going for the three "most obvious" each time... Masunoyama also had a great performance this basho, and I also considered including him...

But since members have already started voting on this, I will not make a change now, and include more nominations (if/when needed) from next basho on...

[Itachi 396]

Firstly, I didn't do any analysis before making my choices so I may even end up disagreeing with myself once some things are pointed out to me but here are my first thoughts on the poll questions.

For the youngest category, I selected Hisanotora. I was very interested in him pre-basho but I was concerned about how he would be after missing so much time to injuries. I was rewarded in the Jo-Game and in Banzuke Surfing for my choice and I wish I'd had the guts to take him in PTYW too (but there's no joker there and no recourse if he becomes one of those non-preannounced kyujos we tend to see from these long term injury guys).

I realize the accomplishments of the higher ranked teens are probably more impressive due to the superior competition they faced but if you factor in the comeback from injury factor, perhaps Hisanotora's zensho was still the most impressive. Well, if not most impressive, was it the most surprising? A zensho without any recent good records or even a history of much higher banzuke position? I'm just really pleased with how his basho turned out. It vindicates my method of marking lower division rikishi for success.

For the next youngest category, I felt I had little choice but to vote for Goeido. Just surviving uninjured and with a kachikoshi at M3 is an amazing feat that is not easily managed by any non-sanyaku regular. Fukuoka's zensho victory from the top of Makushita is really amazing too. Was it more amazing? I wasn't able to watch the bouts, I'm just judging by the facts of how difficult the acheivement must have been given the level of competition. Upper Maegashira and promotion zone Makushita are definitely two of the toughest spots on the banzuke to get good results I would say so any good records there are impressive to me.

For the oldest category, the ex-college guys, it was hard to feel overly impressed by any of them. Both Tokitenku and Tamanoshima had in the past done well as upper maegashira consistently enough that I have been disappointed in their recent struggles. Tamanoshima must be the oldest one and he has frequently been able to pick up easy victories from the bottom of Makuuchi but he's lost his ability to beat guys who tend to be ranked higher than that. His 11-4 is not much of a surprise to me. The only reason I couldn't say I expected it is that he's been kind of unreliable. I just never know which version of him is going to show up.

I think Tokitenku can still compete in upper Makuuchi but he's had a bit of a struggle lately. Maybe he's got some nagging injury problem, I don't know. He did ok but 9 from mid-Makuuchi is nothing to get excited about if you're an fairly solid upper-Makuuchi caliber guy.

Homasho, for me, still has that new, up and coming feel to him. I'm not sure how long he's been in Makuuchi but it hasn't been as long as those other two and I still feel he can be an upper-Makuuchi guy but he hasn't had enough time, free of injury, to establish himself there (or show that he can't). His recent tumble to lower Makuuchi, to me, was the product of some underlying injury problem and I expect he can float back up once whole. 11 wins isn't that incredible for a healthy rikishi who could be an upper-Makuuchi regular so I'm not super impressed but more relieved that he must be sort of ok again. He got a sansho so I guess the kyokai thought he did well enough. I thought he seemed like the best choice based on that.

As for evaluating the poll itself, sure, I guess there may be a long list of interesting young rikishi and ex-college guys to consider but just picking three of each in a few categories simplified the decision enough to suck me in while an open ended or more heavily populated poll may not have.

Edited January 25, 2009 by Itachi

[Azumashida 1]

Interesting comments!

Firstly, I didn't do any analysis before making my choices so I may even end up disagreeing with myself once some things are pointed out to me but here are my first thoughts on the poll questions.

For the youngest category, I selected Hisanotora. I was very interested in him pre-basho but I was concerned about how he would be after missing so much time to injuries. I was rewarded in the Jo-Game and in Banzuke Surfing for my choice and I wish I'd had the guts to take him in PTYW too (but there's no joker there and no recourse if he becomes one of those non-preannounced kyujos we tend to see from these long term injury guys).

I realize the accomplishments of the higher ranked teens are probably more impressive due to the superior competition they faced but if you factor in the comeback from injury factor, perhaps Hisanotora's zensho was still the most impressive. Well, if not most impressive, was it the most surprising? A zensho without any recent good records or even a history of much higher banzuke position? I'm just really pleased with how his basho turned out. It vindicates my method of marking lower division rikishi for success.

Tokizakura's performance was quite surprising too, he never did better than 5-2 in three and a half years and he will now be promoted to makushita with a zensho basho - although admittedly he wasn't that close to his career highest rank of Sd14e. But it's true that Hisanotora's yusho was quite an upset, he didn't strike me as a very strong candidate when I entered my picks for the lower division games, although he always finished 5-2 in the three occurrences when he competed through the whole basho while in jonokuchi. As a matter of fact, prior to this basho there had been only two possible scores for him in 7 jonokuchi basho: 5-2 and 1-0-6, which he did 4 (!) times. Quite a strange pattern... Let's hope he stays away from injury in the future.

For the next youngest category, I felt I had little choice but to vote for Goeido. Just surviving uninjured and with a kachikoshi at M3 is an amazing feat that is not easily managed by any non-sanyaku regular.

Goeido gets my vote too, but he's my favourite rikishi so I may be a bit biased. What I find a bit surprising is that, of the 16 rikishi ranked higher than him on the banzuke, he faced only 9. I have a feeling the "authorities" also like him very much and tend to "protect" him when setting the torikumi. Even though he was doing well he didn't get to face either yokozuna - though admittedly, he was probably just below the mark where he would have had to automatically face them. All his 5 losses came against guys ranked higher than him (IOW he was 4-5 against the joi-jin), which suggests that he may still struggle next basho for his second sanyaku experience...

For the oldest category, the ex-college guys, it was hard to feel overly impressed by any of them.

This may have been one of the least impressive basho from them "collectively". Generally speaking, they seem to be less and less present at the very top (only one among the 11 rikishi sanyaku and above, and just 2 wins overall this basho!), although there are probably overall more and more of them who are sekitori... When selecting them I even considered nominating Yoshikaze, as I found his 6-9 (with several very spirited lost bouts) surprisingly good...

Edited January 27, 2009 by Azumashida

[Asashosakari 20,251]

Goeido gets my vote too, but he's my favourite rikishi so I may be a bit biased. What I find a bit surprising is that, of the 16 rikishi ranked higher than him on the banzuke, he faced only 9. I have a feeling the "authorities" also like him very much and tend to "protect" him when setting the torikumi. Even though he was doing well he didn't get to face either yokozuna - though admittedly, he was probably just below the mark where he would have had to automatically face them.

That's hardly unusual though. If the all the top #16 were from different stables, the #17-ranked guy would probably face no sanyaku at all, and only one or two of the maegashira that are ranked higher than he is. As it was, he got most "necessary" sanyaku opponents (Oshu, Mickey, Ama) due to same-heya considerations, missed Aminishiki because he exited the basho too early, and missed Kotoshogiku because they do try to break up the "top 16 roundrobin" pattern for the maegashira a bit (and those two started off 6-2 and 2-6 respectively so they weren't an obvious second-week pairing). And when Kotomitsuki went kyujo and Goeido became a regular top 16 rikishi he received a full sanyaku blast for his last three days. Perfectly normal schedule, IMO.

Yokozuna almost never face anybody outside of their personal top 16 opponents and with the increased size of sanyaku right now it's even less likely than before, because nearly the only reason they'll switch somebody out is when a maegashira is already makekoshi, and right now they'll never face a maegashira after the first week so that simply can't happen.

This may have been one of the least impressive basho from them "collectively". Generally speaking, they seem to be less and less present at the very top (only one among the 11 rikishi sanyaku and above, and just 2 wins overall this basho!), although there are probably overall more and more of them who are sekitori... When selecting them I even considered nominating Yoshikaze, as I found his 6-9 (with several very spirited lost bouts) surprisingly good...

I think I would have voted for him...as it was I went for Tamanoshima, who (out of the three listed) exceeded my expectations the most. I honestly wasn't sure we'd see him at a single-digit rank again.

It looks like it'll be a long time until my "next college rikishi to become sekiwake" poll gets a resolution...

Edited January 27, 2009 by Asashosakari

[Azumashida 1]

Yokozuna almost never face anybody outside of their personal top 16 opponents and with the increased size of sanyaku right now it's even less likely than before, because nearly the only reason they'll switch somebody out is when a maegashira is already makekoshi, and right now they'll never face a maegashira after the first week so that simply can't happen.

Yes, probably Goeido's rank of M3w was a bit misleading in that with 11 sanyaku and above, it becomes less of a clear-cut joi-jin position.

[Azumashida 1]

And the winners are:

Teenager of the basho: Ryuden (2nd time)

Young rikishi of the basho: Goeido (2nd time)

Ex-university rikishi of the basho: Homasho (1st time)

Thanks for your votes!