Kabutoyama Oyakata-the guy who decides the kimarite, talks

[Kintamayama 47,111]

Kabutoyama Oyakata-the guy who decides the winning kimarite spoke today. (Incidentally, he's the father of Fujinokawa and soon to be sekitori Makushita Ikarigata.)

 Kabutoyama Oyakata (53, ex- Oikari)  spoke with an NHK announcer about the behind-the-scenes stories of winning kimarites. He appeared at a talk show for Oyakata at the Sumo Museum today.   Kabutoyama is in charge of deciding winning kimarites during tournaments, and the topic of winning kimarite became a hot topic lately. Clear winning kimarite are announced by the gyoji in charge of announcing the kimarite at his own discretion. When the gyoji is unsure of his decision, he calls an internal line to confirm with the Oyakata in charge of deciding winning kimarite in the video booth. Kabutoyama Oyakata confided, "NHK announcers call out winning moves instantly. That's why they study them so hard. There are senior, older announcers who can call the winning moves faster than us. So sometimes our judgment of winning kimarite are influenced by them." On the other hand, there are times when the winning kimarite are judged differently by the NHK announcers and by Kabutoyama Oyakata. In particular, there are times when his views differ from those of announcer Fujii Yasuo, and it seems that there have been times when the winning kimarite judged by Kabutoyama have been questioned. "I happened to be sitting across from announcer Fujii during Makuuchi (as a commentator), and when we started talking about winning moves, I thought I'd just say it right there on the spot, so I said, 'We don't really get along, do we? We didn't quite click, but sometimes I do go with the announcer's judgment." He delighted the audience with his little-known insider knowledge.

Edited September 15 by Kintamayama

[Octofuji 423]

"There are senior, older announcers who can call the winning moves faster than us. So sometimes our judgment of winning kimarite are influenced by them"

That's remarkably (and refreshingly) honest

[warusawa 23]

"They ain't nothin' till I call them..." ;)

[Oskanohana 357]

Nice. Now I know to whom I'll be sending my big pile of kimarite complaints.

Edited September 18 by Oskanohana

[Gurowake 4,140]

I've always been fascinated by there being official kimarite when they don't really affect anything.  I suppose it's like a baseball game's official scorer deciding between an error or a hit, where there are official records kept of things that are absolutely meaningless to any outcome.

Edited September 19 by Gurowake

[themistyseas 242]

On 19/09/2025 at 10:39, Gurowake said:

I've always been fascinated by there being official kimarite when they don't really affect anything.

I love it, and thank you @Kintamayama as ever for translating this insight. I think it really helps our understanding of the sport as a whole, and I don't even just mean foreign people. It's interesting to be able to look through tools like the DB and see what kind of rikishi someone was, even if you weren't alive or following the sport at that time. I actually was out with a Japanese fan the other night and showed them the DB and the information in it, and they had a real moment realising that this is all out there. In that sense (and I'm not trying to be argumentative or anything, hahaha), I think there is a bit of a qualitative difference because you can tell from a guy getting hits if he was a good hitter (if he hit .300 or .275 over his career), or what type of hit it was. But while we know that from a rikishi's record and rank if he was good, we don't know what he was good at. I would almost liken it to like on base or slugging percentage: it tells us how the guy succeeded. And I think that's the cool thing about the official kimarite because we can find these really interesting anomalies that give us a whole other layer of depth both historically and also in the moment. 30 years from now people might go "what the hell is the deal with this Ura guy?" It is so cool.

[Tsuchinoninjin 1,287]

On 18/09/2025 at 22:39, Gurowake said:

I've always been fascinated by there being official kimarite when they don't really affect anything.  I suppose it's like a baseball game's official scorer deciding between an error or a hit, where there are official records kept of things that are absolutely meaningless to any outcome.

I suggest it’s a little deeper than just score keeping, the specific set of kimarite is one of the things that makes sumo sumo, and not judo.

I think now it’s taken for granted but there seemed to be a much more colorful discussion around this in the prewar days. I guess it also depends if one believes there is a distinction between kimarite and waza.