Call me crazy...

It would almost be a confession, if I were ashamed of it. Let's pretend it is, for the sake of drama and tension. Ladies and gentlemen, I have a shaaaaameful confession, which I am only now able to bring myself to admit publicly. The only sport which has ever managed to hold my attention is sumo. There, I said it!

I love sumo, and I don't care who knows! I know the names of rikishi! (Sumo wrestler in Japanese, for the uninitiated) I can tell you the requirements for a promotion to ozeki! (The 2nd highest rank, below yokozuna) I can list the most common kimarite, and can tell you why one 5 second bout was way, way more impressive than another 5 second bout because that mother lover just used mitokorozeme, a technique which has only been seen once in the modern era of sumo! I find the salt throwing, and the staring contests a riveting display of martial prowess!!!

Sumo is a sport which most Americans seem to meet with two primary reactions:

a)It's boring. They posture, squat around, throw salt, and look at each other for 5 minutes, then fight for 5 seconds, and call it a day. What nonsense is this? Where are the flying clotheslines? Where are the cages, the bloody noses, the dick punches!? How could you possibly get excited about that?

b)It's profoundly ironic. Sumo is a sport in which being extremely fat is an asset, nay, a necessity. This is in a country where people are generally rail thin, and the dieting and weight-loss industry is large enough to form its own country, albeit a very neurotic, skittish one.

They are not entirely invalid criticisms. I myself often do something else while watching sumo to combat the extremely long down time between bouts, read a book for example. Or write this blog post. A lot of sumo wrestlers are pretty damn out of shape. Not all of them mind you. There's a fine line between "fat, muscular" and "fat...faaaaaat" and if you look at the ten or so guys camped out in the sanyaku (top 4 ranks) this becomes painfully obvious.

I used to marvel at exactly how the hell anyone could get so worked up over a sport, any sport. I have seen grown men weep, openly, to the point of buckling knees, when their team has lost at a crucial moment in the season. Not to rag on "the ex", but she like all Buffalo residents is a fanatical Sabres fan, and I recall one particularly crushing defeat which kept them from the playoffs where she was heartbroken, and existentially void for about a week. Being a good boyfriend, I was concerned enough to be in another state at the time.

For the record my love of sumo does not extend to this pinnacle, not yet at least. There are fighters I like, and watching the yokozuna Asashoryu retire as the result of a scandal (in which he punched a non-rikishi in the face while out drinking) about a month ago was mildly heartbreaking, but in more of a "Gee, that really sucks...OK, what's for lunch!" as opposed to "I just...I just can't see the point in living anymore..." way.

So why do I like it so much? For all of its reputation as a terribly boring sport, the number of individual inspiring moments is inexplicably high.

This tournament just finished its 9th day, of 15. Baruto, the absolute giant of a rikishi from Estonia who is currently ranked just below ozeki at sekiwake, just won his 9th straight victory this tournament, making him undefeated going into the 10th day. Hakuho, now the solitary yokozuna after Asashoryu's retirement also sits at 9-0. Baruto is currently up for ozeki review, and the prevailing thought is if he can get more than 10 wins, he's got it in the bag. But he's fighting like crazy, and there is a possibility, albeit slim, that he is in contention to actually win this tournament. The tension is amazing every single time he steps into the ring. Baruto is a very popular fighter because inside the ring he fights honorably, and outside of the ring he is always smiling, an all around nice guy to have representing the sport. Not to mention he's huuuuuge, and blond-ish. Plus I personally love him because lately he gets interviewed after fights a lot, and he has just the most adorable "Oh no, Japanese happening, go brain go! No...Noooooooooo" panic moment every single time he is spoken to. It leads to some pretty fantastic mumbling, and the occasional brilliant one liner "Baruto! Now that you are up to 9 wins is the pressure more, or less?" "Well...pressure is pressure." Classic.

This basic scenario, or something similar to it, happens in every single tournament. Last tournament it was Baruto stopping yokozuna Hakuho's 30 consecutive win streak. At the tournament I saw in Tokyo, not only did a European (Kotooshu, ozeki) win the tournament, but there was some amazing bad blood between the two yokozuna after Asashoryu gave Hakuho an extra shove into the ground after the fight was over, and the two nearly got into a brawl in the ring (which is considered sacred. Really, really sacred. So sacred women aren't allowed to step foot in it. Yes, its also sexism, but that's another post.)

I have yet to see a properly boring tournament on the macro-level. It's also usually pretty tense on the micro-level too, when it comes to fighters struggling to make their 8 wins. A fighter who wins more than he loses in a tournament either holds his rank or moves up. A fighter who fails and loses more than he wins is demoted. There is no other way to change rank within the sport. Everything is based on one's performance in the ring. And maybe one's ability at fixing matches, but that too is another post.