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SOS - Shinjinrui on Sumo |
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Chris Gould
Chris sinks his teeth into how sumo can go about pulling in the younger
fans - currently so noticeable by their absence. The first of a
three-part series.
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Sumo World Championships |
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Mark Buckton
Mark Buckton reports from Sakai near Osaka, site of the latest Sumo World Championships.
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Rikishi of Old |
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Joe Kuroda
Joe Kuroda finishes off his look at former yokozuna Minanogawa.
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Sumo 101 / Eric Evaluates |
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Eric Blair
Eric expains sumo fan terminology - with the inevitable twist - for
those just getting into the sport and still subject to the know it alls.
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Age stands still for no man |
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Joe Kuroda
Former ozeki Kiyokuni will retire in November under the compulsory '65
and you are out' rule. JK takes a look at this quiet earth mover.
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Feel the Sumo |
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Eduardo de Paz
Read and feel the renowned Leonishiki's passion for all things sumo at his first live event.
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SFM Interview |
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Mark Buckton
Mark interviews Colin Carroll - again - Irish star of Sakai.
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Photo Bonanza |
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See the Aki Basho bonanza as well as the largest collection of pics you
are likely to see on the Sumo World Championships earlier in October.
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Aki Basho Summary |
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Lon Howard
Lon wraps the September Aki Basho and throws in some henka sighting results for good measure.
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Lower Division Rikishi |
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Mikko Mattila
The lower divisions, their members and results get the once over thanks to Mikko's eye of things 'beneath the curtain'.
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Kimarite Focus |
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Mikko Mattila
Mikko's latest clarification of several of the sport's plethora of kimarite.
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Amateur Angles |
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Howard Gilbert
Howard Gilbert - manager of New Zealand's amateur sumo team takes a look at the approaching Russians.
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Kokugi Konnections |
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Todd Lambert
Click on Todd's bimonthly focus on three of the best sumo sites online.
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Fan Debate |
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Facilitator - Lon Howard
Jesse Lake and Rich Pardoe hammer out their differences on a current furor - promotion criteria.
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SFM Cartoons |
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Benny Loh & Stephen Thompson
In this issue's cartoon bonanza, sit back and enjoy Benny Loh's
offerings and put a caption to Stephen Thompson's picture to win
yourselves a banzuke.
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Sumo Odds ’n’ Ends |
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SFM's interactive elements including Henka Sightings, Elevator Rikishi and Eternal Banzuke!
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Readers' Letters |
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See what our readers had to say since we last hit your screens.
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Sumo Quiz |
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The Quizmaster
Answer the Qs and win yourself next basho’s banzuke.
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Tokyo,
spoke for many peers when saying: “I don’t like Akebono as a fighter.
He is just heavy. Not strong. No technique either.” Other teenagers
simply laugh whenever the words “Akebono” and “K-1” inhabit the same
sentence. Michiko, the midwife from Toyama, sympathetically tried to
defend the rank of yokozuna in the light of Akebono’s thrashing. “A
yokozuna is just… God!” she exclaimed. “[But] you watched the K-1 fight
and he was not a yokozuna. I can’t respect that.”
Her implication was that had Akebono – or indeed any great yokozuna –
fought Bob Sapp like a yokozuna, he would have won. It is true that
Akebono faced Sapp while being considerably short of peak condition.
Unfortunately for Michiko’s sentiments, though, a much fitter Akebono
has since fought eight K-1 fights and has only triumphed in one of
them. In his brave quest to become the first yokozuna to test his
skills against – and prove his superiority over – martial artists from
other
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disciplines,
he has instead cruelly exposed sumo’s limitations. As sumo prohibits
closed fists, sumotori are unable to practice absorbing punches to the
head, and this places them at an immediate disadvantage in the K-1
ring. Whenever a sumotori sheds blood and collapses due to a punch (and
Akebono is not the only ex-rikishi to have suffered this fate in K-1),
the stereotypical shinjinrui conceptions of elegant, muscled K-1
athletes versus doddery, obese sumo wrestlers receive an emphatic stamp
of validation.
To allay such (mis)conceptions, the NSK should embrace the following
strategy. It must simply highlight the years of training that sumotori
must undergo before they become exceptional makunouchi warriors. It
must then remind shinjinrui that it also takes years of dedication for
K-1 fighters to truly master their mixed-martial art. It must
discretely explain away Akebono’s defeat by stressing that nobody who
suddenly switches a martial art can expect to train for a mere few
weeks and then
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defeat
an experienced opponent. Crucially, it must then stress that the
disadvantages faced by Akebono in K-1 would be mirrored by those facing
by Bob Sapp were he to suddenly become a sumo-ist. Ironically enough,
Sapp did quip before his match with Akebono that “we could do it sumo
rules”. Had the former yokozuna held him to his word, he would surely
have altered a few shinjinrui perceptions of sumotori. Perhaps the NSK
should call Sapp’s bluff and offer a place in a heya to any K-1 fighter
who is willing. Sumo would certainly generate additional interest in
the unlikely event that a K-1 athlete would accept the offer.
This is but an introduction to S.O.S. In the next issue of SFM, we
spotlight the unease with which young Japanese view sumo personalities,
and examine whether more youngsters would feel inclined to watch sumo
if it produced a Japanese Yokozuna, offered women a more prominent
role, or permitted sumotori to show more emotion.
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