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| Attention to Akeni
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Carolyn Todd
SFM's newest addition to the writing staff takes an
in-depth look at akeni, their history and production techniques
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| Rikishi of Old
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Joe Kuroda
Joe Kuroda slides former yokozuna Minanogawa under his SFM microscope |
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| Eric Evaluates
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Eric Blair
Eric's wit scythes through the SML and makes clear his opinion of where the future lies for online sumo forums. |
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Eternal Banzuke Phase II
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Lon Howard
Stats, equations and mathematics all lead to a list of sumo's most prolific up and downers
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Heya Peek
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Mark Buckton
Mihogaseki, former home of Estonian sekitori Baruto is toured (and peeked at) by SFM's Editor-in-Chief
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Nagoya Basho Summary
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Lon Howard
Lon gives us his Nagoya basho summary, along with the henka sightings results
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Lower Division Rikishi
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Mikko Mattila
Mikko Mattila casts his watchful eye over lower division goings on in makushita and below.
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Aki Ones to Watch
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Carolyn Todd
Carolyn takes over the job of rikishi job performance prediction for SFM as she looks at those to keep an eye on come September |
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Kimarite Focus
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Mikko Mattila
Our man Mikko's latest trio of kimarite get thrown about the SFM literary dohyo |
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Amateur Angles
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Howard Gilbert
Howard returns with the second of his columns on the amateur sumo scene.
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Sumo Game
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| SFM's very own quiz comes in for a bit of self scrutiny by our secretive man of questions. We'll call him 'X'. |
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Sumo in Print
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Barbara Ann Klein
SFM’s Editor reviews “The Little Yokozuna”, a book for “young” (and older) adults
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| Kokugi Connections
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Todd Lambert
Check out Todd's bimonthly focus on 3 of the WWW's best sumo sites
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Fan Debate
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Facilitator - Lon Howard
Keri Sibley and Eduardo de Paz ponder the concept of ‘to pay or not to pay’ makushita salaries
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SFM Cartoons
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Stephen Thompson
Sit back and enjoy the offerings of one of sumo's premier artists |
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Lets Hear From You
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| What was it that made you a sumo fan? SFM’s own Todd Lambert details his path into sumofandom
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| Sumo Quiz |
The Quizmaster
Answer the Qs and win yourself next basho’s banzuke. |
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higher at M8 at Nagoya. The 7-8 he posted in
Nagoya probably felt like a kachi-koshi as he had to win 5 of his last
6 bouts to get even that. The Robo-Cop is pushing his makuuchi
luck, for sure.
Three familiar stalwarts are again out of makuuchi luck and will be
re-entering juryo. They are M14 Toyozakura (5-10), M15 Buyuzan
(4-11)
Buyuzan
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and
M16 Kitazakura (5-10).
Given their track records, somehow you expect to see all three of them
back before long. On the way out this time they’ll take along M16
Daimanazuru who could only pull off two wins in his makuuchi
debut. Dreadfully overmatched, he’ll fall far enough into juryo
that it’s unlikely he’ll see makuuchi again soon, if ever.
There is little doubt that the Upset of the Basho for Nagoya occurred
on day 9. Besides the yusho chase – if you want to call it a
chase – there were only two things fans really cared about:
the promotion runs of Hakuho and Miyabiyama. What grand irony it
was that it was their mutual match-up that doomed them both! Miya
caught Hakuho leaning too far forward and slapped him down for Hakuho’s
second loss. That did it right there for both of them as
Miyabiyama had Asashoryu on his plate for day 10 so his fifth
loss |
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was
assured; and he had just spotlighted his own un-ozeki like sumo by
using it to derail a yokozuna train – all in the same motion.
So, despite the fact that Asashoryu has yet to beat Hakuho this year;
despite the injury to his right arm that sent him packing after three
days during Natsu, and still required an arm brace for much of this
basho; and despite all the recent talk and suggestions to the contrary,
it was still business as usual for Asashoryu on the dohyo. He has
17 yusho now and only one challenger in sight, but since that’s one
more than he had at the start of the year, maybe things are about to
change. For right now though, he’s still ‘The Man.’
That’ll do it for now, so it’s back to Tokyo in September. See you then.
Henka Sightings Summary
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