Katsunorifuji

I don’t see any yusho, but wouldn’t be surprised if he won in March. Like most I think he won’t be on the banzuke next year, but I’m also going to predict he hangs around through September of this year.

Thanks, that makes sense and explains a lot.

This might be a dumb question, and with enough Googling effort I could probably find an answer, but if retiring as Ozeki grants a bigger financial benefit than retiring further down the ranks, why don’t we see more Ozeki do it when it is pretty clear they will struggle to ever get the rank back? Does that retirement salary only last a short time and the option of fighting as a rank and filer for a while evens out the financial difference? Or are there other things at play here?

I wouldn’t be surprised to see Takakeisho win multiple yusho but at the same time I wouldn’t be surprised if he didn’t win any. He seems to be the best guy out there every tournament, but loses some matches to people you wouldn’t expect. Based on that I voted two yushos. But I have no idea who wins the other three remaining. I also think he is a safe lock to stay Ozeki this full year. He is clearly the only guy you would expect to make a run at Yokozuna this year, and with the changing of the guard at the top of the banzuke maybe makes it, but I think his inconsistency holds him back this year.

Hi everyone, I’ve been reading the forums for a while now and wanted to join in on the fun. It’s great to see a resource like this online as getting sumo related news isn’t the easiest of things to do. I got really into sumo in 2007 while living in Japan, but after moving back to the states it got really hard to keep up with the action (and virtually impossible to watch). It wasn’t until about two years ago that I realized I could subscribe to TVJapan during the tournaments and record the action. Since then I’ve been following it closely and enjoying it. I am probably not as knowledgeable on the technical aspects and vocabulary of the sumo world but am hoping being here will bring me more up to speed. Kotooshu is my all time favorite (hence my username) but Hokutofuji is the guy I cheer for the most now. I am looking forward to interacting with everyone and the upcoming tournament (which can’t get here fast enough!).