Aki Basho 2021 - Discussion Thread (Spoilers!)

[Seiyashi 4,071]

1 minute ago, Tigerboy1966 said:

23 minutes ago, Atenzan said:

16 hours ago, Sakura said:

I'm delighted by the idea that a cat is called Bob.

I love cats with human names, my own cat is called Peter :)

You feel less silly when you're calling for them to come in from the yard. Bob, Peter, Jim, Maggie or Kate sound more sensible that Twinkle, Tinkerbell, Bossyboots or Peekaboo.

What's wrong with "Here kitty kitty kitty" 

[Atenzan 1,074]

4 minutes ago, Tigerboy1966 said:

You feel less silly when you're calling for them to come in from the yard. Bob, Peter, Jim, Maggie or Kate sound more sensible that Twinkle, Tinkerbell, Bossyboots or Peekaboo.

Peter isn't going outdoors on his own anytime soon, I'm afraid: he was born with only one eye and he can't see out of the other.

[Tigerboy1966 1,376]

14 minutes ago, Atenzan said:

Peter isn't going outdoors on his own anytime soon, I'm afraid: he was born with only one eye and he can't see out of the other.

Maybe we should start a new topic in which we post pictures of our cats. That's what the internet is for. Here's Bob: his favourite sumo wrestlers are Hakuho, Tamawashi, Shohozan and any others who are just generally badass.

EDIT picture did not load. Sorry.

Edited September 26, 2021 by Tigerboy1966
clarify and correct

[Morty 1,480]

35 minutes ago, Katooshu said:

Those knees are the big question with Teru for me. How long can he stay healthy for? I still worry that they could go anytime. But if we just take him in his current form, and with Hak competing infrequently, I think he'll run his yusho numbers up pretty quickly. The rest of the field just does not have many standout competitors at the moment; no doubt there are some who seem to have excellent potential, but they are not major threats yet.

I agree that it is the knees that will ultimately determine how long he can go and how successful he will be. Currently he's riding a wave of good health but we saw how fast he plummeted the last time his health failed him. 

I also wouldn't assume he is just going to win everything without competition. Not counting Hak there are eight previous yusho winners on the current makuuchi banzuke. They are all inconsistent and I'm assuming Tokushoryu and Tochinoshin, and probably Tamawashi are never winning another one. But while the other five are inconsistent, they have all proven they can compete, and win, at the highest level, some of them more than once. Sumo always surprises....

[lackmaker 432]

3 minutes ago, Morty said:

agree that it is the knees that will ultimately determine how long he can go and how successful he will be. Currently he's riding a wave of good health but we saw how fast he plummeted the last time his health failed him. 

Are we talking about Bob or Peter?

[Tigerboy1966 1,376]

2 minutes ago, Morty said:

I agree that it is the knees that will ultimately determine how long he can go and how successful he will be. Currently he's riding a wave of good health but we saw how fast he plummeted the last time his health failed him. 

Since he came back in March 2019 Terunofuji has missed three matches through injury. He's certainly fragile, but he's not exactly falling to bits. My guess is that he has about three years and six more yusho left in the tank. He will probably retire around 2025. After that it's just crickets and tumbleweed.

[Morty 1,480]

1 minute ago, lackmaker said:

Are we talking about Bob or Peter?

No, my dog Wanda. Her right back knee is buggered

 

[lackmaker 432]

Can no longer wander?

[Morty 1,480]

1 minute ago, lackmaker said:

Can no longer wander?

Oh she can wander (that's where the name comes from). She has recently been diagnosed with dementia and tends to just go in whatever direction she wants. She is 14 years old and in great shape for her age, but like her knee, her brain is also buggered

[Yamanashi 3,728]

1 hour ago, Atenzan said:

I love cats with human names, my own cat is called Peter :)

Strange: before he became a novelist, jazz- and cat-lover Haruki Murakami ran a jazz bar in Sendagaya called Peter Cat.

[Seiyashi 4,071]

2 hours ago, Amamaniac said:

Terunofuji's timing is fortunate in a sense.  Unfortunate in the sense that he is secured promotion to the highest rank a little late in his career with 6 years squandered due to injury.  But fortunate in that Hakuho might be retiring soon, and then it will be pretty clear sailing for the knee-less wonder.  As long as he doesn't get reinjured, I can see him picking up a good number of Top Division championships, easily surpassing Kakuryu's 6 and likely surpassing Harumafuji's 9.  

I think it was completely fortunate in that he missed out, and therefore avoided being dragged into, the complete charade that was the yokozuna kyujo parade over the past two years that began with Kisenosato. In the hypothetical scenario where he hadn't been injured gravely enough to fall down the ranks, but still picked up the usual injuries in sumo, he would most probably have been retired by now and possibly a historical sidenote. His injuries and illnesses wouldn't have been given so much time to recover, and Kakuryu at least would be getting more prominence over him in the yusho tallies. Don't forget that he also applied for citizenship in 2017 but only got it very recently (I think after his ozeki promotion only); he would have been in the same unenviable position as Kakuryu in trying to drag out his retirement to wait for his citizenship.

Now, not only is he a welcome breath of fresh air to usher in the post-Hakuho era, he has a chance to match his own senpai yokozuna and try for dai-yokozuna status in his own right, which adds even more to his already pretty astounding legacy. It's kind of deliciously ironic that arguably the most two inspiring rikishi, for various reasons, in the modern era are Mongolians, but it is what it is.

Edited September 26, 2021 by Seiyashi

[Sue 483]

Endo vs. Okinoumi: 10 wins each going into the match, and their head-to-head series tied at 10-10. That has to be a fairly rare occurrence.

[Seiyashi 4,071]

5 minutes ago, Sue said:

Endo vs. Okinoumi: 10 wins each going into the match, and their head-to-head series tied at 10-10. That has to be a fairly rare occurrence.

Not only rare, but unique, and the highest to have occurred so far (no matches for 11-14):

http://sumodb.sumogames.de/Query_bout.aspx?show_form=0&group_by=basho&group_by2=day&hth=1&wins1=10&winsopt1=1&hthwins1=10&wins2=10&winsopt2=1&hthwins2=10

No results for 9, but two occurrences of 8: the last pair to do it were Takatoriki and Kirishima meeting in Natsu 1994.

Four occurrences for 7 (last pair was Toyonoshima and Futeno in Haru 2009), and 13 results for 6.

Edited September 26, 2021 by Seiyashi

[yorikiried by fate 1,989]

Brilliant basho with a couple of exceptional bouts.

[Thanks Moti for making it available for lazy people like me.]

[Yamanashi 3,728]

7 minutes ago, Seiyashi said:

Not only rare, but unique, and the highest to have occurred so far (no matches for 11-14):

http://sumodb.sumogames.de/Query_bout.aspx?show_form=0&group_by=basho&group_by2=day&hth=1&wins1=10&winsopt1=1&hthwins1=10&wins2=10&winsopt2=1&hthwins2=10

No results for 9, but two occurrences of 8: the last pair to do it were Takatoriki and Kirishima meeting in Natsu 1994.

Four occurrences for 7 (last pair was Toyonoshima and Futeno in Haru 2009), and 13 results for 6.

Wow!  And the Powerball numbers were 22 23 37 62 63 and  ...

Spoiler

19; guess I'm glad I've never tried Powerball.

 

Edited September 26, 2021 by Yamanashi

[Tigerboy1966 1,376]

This may be a one for Trivia bits but...

What happened on day 13 of this basho which had not happened since 23 November 2016, day 11 of that year's Kyushu basho? It involves Terunofuji...

Edited September 26, 2021 by Tigerboy1966
copy edit

[neonbelly 226]

Contrary to some others I prefer a strong yokozuna taking no-drama yushos to an open race nine times out of ten.

A wide open race is exciting if someone unexpected is challenging the champ, but that depends on the champ having a track record of domination. Too much parity detracts from the grandeur of the rank and the significance of an upset.

[RabidJohn 1,665]

3 hours ago, Atenzan said:

I love cats with human names, my own cat is called Peter :)

But Peter is a rabbit's name.
I've had dogs called Rolf, Ken and Frank, and I knew a bloke with a jack russell called Steve.
Nowt against 'em, but I'm allergic to cats...

---

Congratulations to Terunofuji for a yusho as a shin-yokozuna. I've no idea how many more his knees will let him win, but this surely won't be the last.

The ozeki failed to shine this time, but at least we have two with yusho track records. Back when I started watching sumo again six years ago, none of the three ozeki had one.

Mitakeumi and Daieisho could both snatch more yusho, but I'm interested to see how Kiribayama and Hoshoryu develop.

[RabidJohn 1,665]

Damn this double posting when it lands on a new page!

Edited September 26, 2021 by RabidJohn

[Benihana 1,901]

Bob is a great name, but you have to pronouce it like Rowan Atkinson does 

Spoiler

 

My current cats are Binky (Death's horse from Discworld) and Hinkie (german for Limpy), because he has only 3 legs. Should have called him Turbo, in fast corners his butt tends to spin out of control like the infamous Porsche.

This basho was okay-ish. Too bad we didn't have a playoff. We may have seen a nice number of good, entertaining bouts, but Terunofuji dominating in such a way is a bit worrying. This was the first basho since Nagoya 2019, none of the sanyaku below Yokozuna managed a double digit KK. That's even more worrying. One or two of the young and promising finally have to notch it up a bit. 

[Jakusotsu 5,815]

1 hour ago, Tigerboy1966 said:

This may be a one for Trivia bits but...

What happened on day 13 of this basho which had not happened since 23 November 2016, day 11 of that year's Kyushu basho? It involves Terunofuji...

Hmm...no clue.

[Yamanashi 3,728]

Down in Makushita, Narutobeya's new Ms15TD Oshoma/Delgerbayar will probably not arrive as the heya's top-ranked rikishi.  20-year-old Oshouma from Ishikawa finished 6-1 at his highest rank of Ms23e; this will probably put him at ~Ms8 next basho.

Edited September 26, 2021 by Yamanashi

[yorikiried by fate 1,989]

5 hours ago, Atenzan said:

I love cats with human names, my own cat is called Peter :)

Let's get this thread full feline, shall we?

I once lived in a shared flat, where a flatmate had a cat called Frau Müller. She was fluffy and very grumpy, liked to claim my room as territory, allowed me to give her some stroking treatment daily, only to claw me without failure when she was finished.

She also had the funny trait of uttering an involuntary little Meow whenever she landed on the floor after jumping down from somewhere. Naturally, the Meow always sounded very disappointed.

[Tigerboy1966 1,376]

1 hour ago, Jakusotsu said:

2 hours ago, Tigerboy1966 said:

This may be a one for Trivia bits but...

What happened on day 13 of this basho which had not happened since 23 November 2016, day 11 of that year's Kyushu basho? It involves Terunofuji...

Hmm...no clue.

Clue. It's something that could not possibly happen before the last day of the Nagoya basho in any year.

[yorikiried by fate 1,989]

Ah, 60 wins.