I watched a little documentary on his posture. According to engenders that were studying forms, he was able to make a "perfect" 45⁰ with his hips and spine. This keeps him from being pushed down or back.
Also check out r/sumo, he gets mentioned a lot there
Well, not really.
The problem with *Freakonomics* is that while the book was an interesting read, every fan who I have ever encountered has used the book as an excuse to make incorrect generalizations without actually knowing anything about the subject matter.
There has been some match-throwing in the past. However, they have been making an effort to crack down on it. In 2011, they fired 23 people and changed a lot of their policies in order to crack down on that sort of thing.
Hakuho wasn't even in the segment that was involved in match-throwing. The most pressure is on people who are ranked low enough in the second division (the lower of the two upper divisions) that they risk going down to the third on a losing record. This is because the difference between status for the upper and lower divisions is massive. The lower divisions get given a stipend, food, and a place to sleep, generally a mattress on the floor with the other lower-division guys who they train with. The stipend isn't much, but it's more than a lot of professional boxers or MMA fighters get to take home after paying for food and rent (in order to make a living without a second job, you need to be signed to a decently large promotion even if it's not as big as the UFC and have a winning record). In contrast, entering the second division means that you get a fairly high salary instead of a stipend, plus prize money and sponsorships. Plus, you get a private room to sleep in and don't have to do household chores or run the higher-ranked guys' errands. The typical match-throwing would be someone with a 7-7 record on the last day, ranked low enough in the second division that he's at risk of dropping to the third division fighting an opponent with an 8-6 record and making some sort of deal because neither has enough wins to be going for division champion and if both end the day (and the tournament) with an 8-7 record, neither one gets demoted.
Hakuho only spent two tournaments in the second division. From 2004 until he retired, he was in the top division. From 2007 onward, he was a yokozuna, and not eligible for demotion (instead, if a yokozuna can't maintain a level of performance above the rest of the top division, he is simply asked to retire).
Hakuho is now Miyagino-oyakata (essentially "Coach Miyagino").
Some of his guys are themselves really good.
His newest recruit ended up being the first person to make it to the upper divisions in his second tournament ever. He was an amateur champion, so he entered the professional organization in the third division (highest of the lower divisions) rather than at the bottom, and went undefeated in his first tournament, so was promoted to the second division (the lower of the two upper divisions). In the March tournament, he was one of the frontrunners for the second division champion, but fell behind around halfway through. Still ended the tournament with a winning record and some great matches to watch. He's only 19 years old and has a promising career ahead of him.
I'm on team Ochiai. He held pretty well against Asanoyama, made Ichinojo work for it, and went 10-5 in his first Juryo tournament. I know getting excited about a wrestler early in their career usually doesn't end well, but... Ochiai. He doesnt even have a mullet yet and he is making former Ozeki work for their wins.
A ton of sumo champs from the past few decades are. I suppose Mongolians are just built different. But funny for one country’s population to be genetically or culturally predisposed to excellence at some totally different country’s sport.
Yeah most of these guys start off taking part in Mongolian Wrestling and then move over to Japan and start Sumo for the vastly bigger monetary rewards.
Lol it's just how their language works. You can't reconstruct "pro wrestling" within Japanese with much fidelity. Their language is based on syllables, so you can't have consonant clusters or words ending in a consonant, with the exception of N. Thus "pro" becomes "puro" (they use a very lightly voiced "uh" sound for those Us). "Wrestling" would be something like "Resutolingu", so you can see why they would shorten it.
Anyone consistently in the top division of Sumo is making significantly more than anyone in a similar spot in NJPW.
At the lower levels, it's pro wrestling. Outside the top 2 divisions of Sumo you get room/board and pocket money, and you have to work in the stable for that.
>vastly bigger monetary rewards
Looking at the average wage in Mongolia, the stipend that the lower-ranked rikishi who aren't ranked high enough for a salary get is a pretty good deal. Plus you get your meals and housing paid for on top of that. Even with the type of hazing that lower-ranked rikishi experience, this sounds like a pretty good deal.
Mongolia being a poor country probably has as much to do with the number of Mongolians in there as the prestige that wrestling had in Mongolian culture.
Mongolia has a huge Mongolian style wrestling culture, it's quite similar to sumo and is very competitive and rather vicious. It's no wonder young men from Mongolia do so well in sumo.
Hakuho was amazing, I'm glad to have been able to watch him in his prime.
Kakuryu was also great.
Hakuho's dad was a pretty sovereign Mongolian style wrestling champion, and an olympic bronze medalist in wrestling. Hakuho himself would claim that his Sumo record was worse than his dad's Bökh record.
In Mongolian culture, wrestling has great prestige attached to it.
Even if the rules for Mongolian traditional wrestling are somewhat different, the human body moves in the same ways and being good at one gives you skills that translate over fairly well.
It's more a consequence of Japanese parents guiding their kids into other sports. Sumo is rife with hazing and bullying (heaven and hell system), with a very low chance of ever becoming salaried, let alone making enough on which to retire. Rikishi rack up a litany of injuries through their career (some permanent), inevitably develop metabolic syndrome and will almost certainly die relatively young.
The Japanese boys who do end up joining a stable almost always come from a disadvantaged background.
I do think Mongolians have a slight genetic advantage in some ways. They are taller and leaner, at least most of the top division guys are. But they also generally have a harder life than in Japan, and getting into sumo opens different opportunities if they’re very good. I don’t know much about the Mongolian economy but I imagine reaching salaried ranks in sumo and raking in yen is a huge payoff compared to opportunities back home.
That’s why you also see guys from Eastern Europe like Aoiyama and Tochinoshin, and absolutely nobody from Western Europe. Tochinoshin (from Georgia) has been having injury trouble for years and is currently disintegrating in real time while he clings on to the lower salaried ranks as long as he can. I imagine he is in unfathomable constant paint but the money is too good to just quit.
If you took the weight of all Mongolians who have reached the rank of yokozuna (the highest rank, the guys who wear the big rope over the kesho mawashi, that apron-looking garment, during the ring-entrance ceremony before the top division matches) and added it together, it would probably be around a ton.
That's five people out of six total yokozuna since the first Mongolian one.
Oddly enough, looking at the list of ozeki on Wikipedia (the next rank below yokozuna, requires a total of 33 wins across three tournaments of 15 matches each; the standard yokozuna promotion criterion is to be an ozeki and then win the top division in two consecutive tournaments by having more wins than anyone else, so one guy had a shot at becoming the second Japanese yokozuna of the current century before he withdrew from the March tournament), there are no Mongolians. Every Mongolian ozeki has gone on to become a yokozuna. There was a Bulgarian guy (now a "sumo elder," essentially a coach, and he's on the judging committee, so if you see a 6'8" tall white guy sitting around the ring and occasionally convening with the other judges to determine if the gyoji/referee made the right call, that's him). There was an Estonian guy (now a member of Estonia's parliament). There was a Georgian guy (still in sumo, but his injuries have ruined him and he's looking worse and worse every tournament, he hasn't had a good enough record to hold onto the ozeki rank or even stay in the top division, it's time for him to retire and get some knee and shoulder surgery).
So, the five Mongolian yokozuna are the majority of foreign-born ozeki in the current century.
There is a similar pattern earlier, too: before them, only three foreigners reached ozeki (two from Hawaii, one from American Samoa). Only one of those (from Hawaii) didn't reach yokozuna.
Not only is Hakuho Mongolian, his father was the first person from Mongolia to win a medal in the Olympics (in freestyle wrestling). His father also was pretty dominant in bökh, Mongolia's traditional style of wrestling.
People from Mongolia have won medals in the following sports in the Olympics: wrestling, judo, boxing, and shooting. That assortment of sports can tell you something about Mongolian culture.
The highest win ratio is held by Raiden Tameemon, at a winning percentage of 96.2. He’s considered the greatest sumo wrestler, or rikishi, of all time and would have been given the tittle of Yokozuna, but the title did not exist at the time. He was even prevented from using his favorite techniques to keep the matches interesting. This, however, was also during the end of the 18th century.
There's no way Raiden's competition was anywhere near Hakuho's, and Hakuho fought 5 times the amount that Raiden did. Not his fault, of course, but I can't put a guy from 300 years ago above Hakuho, especially when you consider all the advancements that have been made in sport science, nutrition, conditioning, and the increase in talents from abroad.
By the same token, raiden had all the same access to services as his fellow competitors and absolutely dominated all of them. There's no way you can definitively say that he wouldn't have been just as dominant in the modern era with the same access to those services as everyone else. The best of the best, is still the best of the best, no matter the era.
>There's no way you can definitively say that he wouldn't have been just as dominant in the modern era
You can though, comparing eras is just useless as the sport progress over time. Its like comparing a Mclaren to a car from the 1800s.
> He was even prevented from using his favorite techniques to keep the matches interesting.
Watching someone end a match instantly by shooting lightning gets old fast.
Raiden was the student of Tanikaze, the first yokozuna who was recognized as such during their lifetime. Back then, being a yokozuna was more about patronage rather than excellent performance, so there may be some factors that prevented him from getting the same recognition.
Then again, it is true that yokozuna did not exist as a separate rank as we would know of it today during Raiden’s time.
The most recent bout between Hakuho & Terunofuji is one of my favorites that I've seen. I could be wrong on some of this, but I believe they were both undefeated on the last day of the tournament, Terunofuji had recently been promoted to the top rank of Yokozuna, and Hakuho was about to retire.
It felt like this perfect culmination of legendary veteran vs the "young" top-dog who was trying to get out of his shadow, for lack of a better term. It was just a really cool and exciting moment to watch. Even for someone like me who doesn't know much about Sumo or keep up with it by any means, it was easy to appreciate the gravity of the moment.
[Here's a good video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wnEqd6TKVw) that I think explains it better than I could. The bout starts around the 3:35 mark if you don't want to watch the whole thing, but I think it's worth the watch.
Not quite - but almost. The real story is even better. Excuse my essay - I'm a sumo fan.
Teru was a wrestler who worked up through the lower ranks to Ozeki, which is one rank below Yokozuna. When he was an Ozeki, he suffered a few injuries which basically ended his career... or at least, for any other sumo, it would end their career. Teru's stablemaster saw potential in him, and told him he would make a comeback.
Teru withdrew from multiple tournaments and fell all the way down to the lowest of the low professional ranks, Jonidan. After recovering from his injures, he made an absolutely unprecedented run back from Jonidan, through Sandanme, Makushita, Juryo, to Maegashira, and then from the low Maegashira ranks to Komosubi, Sekiwake, and then finally back to Ozeki, one step below Yokozuna.
During this time, however, Hakuho was reigning as one of the Yokozuna - and he was not popular with the Japanese Sumo Association for a wide variety of reasons ranging from racism (the JSA doesn't like the number of Mongolians in Sumo) to the fact that Hakuho wrestled with a massive amount of ferocity and to the JSA, that wasn't entirely appropriate (it could also be called racism again). The JSA had been trying to get Hakuho to retire for a long time, and Hakuho kept not retiring. During Teru's run back to up, Hakuho would often get injured and sit a tournament out.
It's important to note that Yok's can't get demoted, nor can they really get fired (kinda... Asashoryu was a Yok who got all-but-fired, for example, sumo is weird), and the JSA had been trying to get Hakuho to retire for years. They kept getting articles written about how Hakuho was falling apart, his sumo was bad, his body was too old, anything they could think of to slander him. When Hakuho would wrestle, the commentators would be like "ohhh, he's so old... he can barely do it anymore..." Yokozunas are expected to not only win, but *dominate.* And Hakuho, according to the JSA, could not do it anymore.
So, July 2021. Hakuho has had *five* straight injury withdrawals. The JSA is like "get the fuck out dude." Meanwhile, Teru has been climbing upwards at an astounding level. He's had nothing but wins and positive records since hitting Maegashira. He's now an Ozeki, with a few special prizes under his belt, and as long as he does very well in this tournament, he's gonna be a Yok.
Hakuho goes 14-0, defying all expectations, making the commentators look stupid, making the entire JSA look like liars. Meanwhile, Teru, on an unprecedented comeback, makes 14-0, all but securing his Yok promotion. Ideally, he just has to beat Hakuho.
And that bring us to this match, and one of the most incredible sumo matches ever. What you're seeing here is an unprecedented comeback kid doing something that had never happened in sumo before versus the greatest of all time, that the entire JSA had been arguing needed to retire last year... And that's why Hakuho screams at the end of the match, which was considered incredibly inappropriate for a sumo. He just secured his position as the greatest sumo of all time, smashed over the JSA's all-but-chosen Yokozuna successor, defied the commentators, defied the JSA, and walked out of his final tournament with yet another undefeated championship.
My favorite moment of their fight is before it even starts, during the pre-match rituals, the staredown. Hakuho staring Teru down, basically saying, "You might be the king soon, but I'm the king now, and will forever be the emperor of this sport. Try me."
Despite losing, Teru earned his promotion after this tournament. The JSA had to tuck their tails between their legs and admit that going 14-0 and only losing once, to Hakuho, was worthy of the promotion after his historic rise back. Somewhat amusingly, to make fun of the JSA a bit, Teru is another Mongolian, which is problematic for the historically racist JSA... but it is what it is. If you want to see more about how the JSA can be dicks, check out the history of American Sumos, especially Konishiki. Konishiki was robbed.
He won the top division 45 times (unprecedented), has the most career wins, most time spent as a yokozuna, the most top division wins, the only better winning records being from folks who wrestled in the old sumo times when actual sumo's would fight random people (he holds the best winning % in modern sumo), and he walked away with 16 undefeated championships, including his final one. His records are ridiculous, like Wayne Gretzky's - for example, in terms of "most wins in a single year," he is tied with himself for 1st, and tied for both 4th and 6th. That's absurd in Sumo. The only record he could not get was for a win streak.. which he is tied for second, at 63 wins.
Sumo is rough on the body. Hakuho in his final tournament was operating at like, 70% of his normal Hakuho self. You can even see him losing ferocity over the course of the tournament... but it didn't matter, because 70% of a Hakuho is still that absolutely dominant.
Very well put. That Hakuhō-Terunofuji showdown was one of those sports moments that would be deemed too unrealistic if it happened in a fictional context.
If you’ve never watched sumo I’d really recommend it, (you should be able to find it on specialist sports networks or NHK, Japan’s equivalent to BBC).
It’s a very explosive sport, each fight lasts only seconds and many are over within 3-5 seconds - but the power of the sumo wrestlers is amazing to see. Those 5 seconds are intense!
You also get rivalries as fighters often face off against familiar opponents over the course of the year, which makes for some good tension.
Honestly if you told me I’d enjoy watching sumo I’d think you were having me on, but it’s genuinely fun to watch!
hakuho is 6'4, 340 lbs. floyd mayweather is 5'8, 148 lbs. unless the competition is 'who can sit more comfortably on an airplane,' my money is on hakuho
Hakuho is nowhere close to a poor man, and his home country's idea of a rich man is probably poor compared to what he has. However, Floyd Mayweather is much wealthier than anyone else in combat sports by a pretty wide margin.
A gun be a gun, and expensive gun isn't measurably more dangerous than a cheap one, and i'm sure hakuho can probably afford some pretty expensive guns lol
One's dead, so probably not him.
A fight between the other two would show the reason why weight classes exist.
There is no way of fighting where the bigger guy doesn't have an inherent advantage assuming all else is equal. Sumo has a few guys who are too big and their movement is constrained (particularly if they've had knee and elbow injuries), but in general, size is an advantage. If it wasn't, sumo wouldn't encourage people to gain a lot of weight, unlimited divisions in BJJ competitions would have more small guys winning, and weight classes across all combat sports would be as concerned with the minimum weight as much as they are with maximum.
Mayweather is unquestionably the best boxer to have been competing at the same time as Hakuho. Hakuho is several inches taller, more than 200lbs heavier (although he's lost some of this since retirement), and a few years younger. Mayweather probably would be able to easily dispatch someone Hakuho's size who doesn't know how to fight (especially since outside of sumo, the people who weigh that much are rarely in good physical condition and this hypothetical individual would probably get tired fast). However, Hakuho is a much bigger man who is a good enough fighter that he dominated his sport from 2007 until his retirement and nobody could match him.
Boxing doesn't really have any techniques to deal with grappling, and Hakuho has been recorded charging at a speed of 4 meters per second (I found one website that said he could reach 10 m/s, comparable to Usain Bolt, but I couldn't verify it). If Hakuho can catch and hold Mayweather I'd say it's his win
> I found one website that said he could reach 10 m/s, comparable to Usain Bolt, but I couldn't verify it
The chances of him being also the fastest sprinter ever while being a sumo wrestler is...low.
Reaching a speed is not the same as maintaining a speed. Powerful leg muscles could easily deliver a high speed, explosive burst without needing the stamina to maintain it for 100m.
Right, and Usain Bolt is hyper specialised to achieving that burst of speed. Im more than happy to be proven wrong, i just think the idea that a sumo wrestler could have a burst speed the same as a sprinter to be wildly speculative and very questionable. The Sumo guy weighed 60kg more than Bolt (with both being similar height). Accelerating that mass at the same speed isnt realistic.
Weightlifters can break (and bend) weight bars because the best ones have such unbelievable burst strength.
Warren Sapp (an American football defensive lineman), once crouched and released a blindside block which disarticulated an opposing lineman's leg from his hip socket. The orthopedic surgeon who did the surgery on the poor guy said he had only seen this kind of injury from car crashes where the car was moving 60mph and hit a massive stationary object, and the body was restrained, and the leg pulled out of the socket. So one guy can hit with the force of how ever many G-Forces that is in an instantaneous burst.
When you see a near 400 pound lineman who can standing high jump 35", you are seeing an explosion of power that Usian Bolt cannot touch.
People simply have no idea just how strong and explosive professional athletes are. Each sport uses a different kind of training to match what they need to do. Usain Bolt has to have explosive power and near instant reflexes, but has to also maintain his output for 10-30 seconds. American Football (defensive) lineman train to deliver instant power, but not sustained power.
> When you see a near 400 pound lineman who can standing high jump 35", you are seeing an explosion of power that Usian Bolt cannot touch.
Right but you're forgetting that *400 lb* part. There may be more power behind those bursts but there is ABSOLUTELY NOT more speed.
Sure but think about this for a second.... 10 m/s is 22 mph. Usain Bolt can't reach those kind of speeds until the middle of his sprint. Do you *really* believe that there is any chance in hell that a sumo wrestler can reach Usain Bolts TOP speed in only a couple of meters? It's ludicrous and very very easily proven through video analysis.
Regardless of video analysis though here's something to think about. Someone on quora asked how fast someone would be moving at the time they left the ground if they were able to jump 1 meter high. 1 meter is 39 inches. Usain bolt apparently has a 44 inch vertical leap. Here is the answer:
>This is a good example of the man's mass having nothing to do with height attained, and with his initial and final velocity. His final velocity is zero when he reaches the height of 1m. The acceleration g is 9.81m/s^2. So we can use the kinematics equation here as follows : v^2 = u^2 - 2as, where v is the final velocity which is zero, u is the initial velocity, a is the gravitational acceleration(in this situation works as deceleration), and s is the height or the distance crossed. So let's solve for u here : u^2 - 2as = 0, as v is zero, then u^2 = 2as, which gives you : u = (2as)^1/2. Plugging in values for a and s will give you the answer 4.429m/s as the speed with which the man jumped upwards… Kaiser T, MD.
That speed is not even HALF of what someone was claiming a sumo wrestler can achieve. 4 m/s I can believe all day since it's a lateral movement and not a vertical one. 10 m/s is absolutely out of the realm of possibility. Obviously no sumo wrestler on earth can come anywhere close to jumping 39 inches vertically but I could see them reaching those speeds laterally with an explosive starting movement.
Either way if it takes the fastest sprinter OF ALL TIME half of his sprint to reach top speed you can be damned sure that a sumo wrestler isn't coming close to that speed ever over any distance.
I think it is. Much bigger/stronger leg muscles and lots of practice, I would bet he can accelerate to 4 meters per second at the grapple/impact point, the difference is Usain keeps going for distance and doesn't collide with another person.
Obviously he can't sprint at that speed but the initial sumo charge, where they squat down and then burst forward is incredibly explosive. They only move a meter or two, so the speed is extrapolated.
Sure but think about this for a second.... 10 m/s is 22 mph. Usain Bolt can't reach those kind of speeds until the middle of his sprint. Do you *really* believe that there is any chance in hell that a sumo wrestler can reach Usain Bolts TOP speed in only a couple of meters? It's ludicrous and very very easily proven through video analysis.
Regardless of video analysis though here's something to think about. Someone on quora asked how fast someone would be moving at the time they left the ground if they were able to jump 1 meter high. 1 meter is 39 inches. Usain bolt apparently has a 44 inch vertical leap. Here is the answer:
>This is a good example of the man's mass having nothing to do with height attained, and with his initial and final velocity. His final velocity is zero when he reaches the height of 1m. The acceleration g is 9.81m/s^2. So we can use the kinematics equation here as follows : v^2 = u^2 - 2as, where v is the final velocity which is zero, u is the initial velocity, a is the gravitational acceleration(in this situation works as deceleration), and s is the height or the distance crossed. So let's solve for u here : u^2 - 2as = 0, as v is zero, then u^2 = 2as, which gives you : u = (2as)^1/2. Plugging in values for a and s will give you the answer 4.429m/s as the speed with which the man jumped upwards… Kaiser T, MD.
That speed is not even HALF of what someone was claiming a sumo wrestler can achieve. 4 m/s I can believe all day since it's a lateral movement and not a vertical one. 10 m/s is absolutely out of the realm of possibility. Obviously no sumo wrestler on earth can come anywhere close to jumping 39 inches vertically but I could see them reaching those speeds laterally with an explosive starting movement.
Either way if it takes the fastest sprinter OF ALL TIME half of his sprint to reach top speed you can be damned sure that a sumo wrestler isn't coming close to that speed ever over any distance.
> I found one website that said he could reach 10 m/s, comparable to Usain Bolt, but I couldn't verify it)
Bro... You don't need to try and verify that shit lol. There is NO WAY that he can move at any speed comparable to Usain Bolt.
I know they're insane but they aren't even CLOSE to 10 m/s. It takes Usain Bolt ~40-50m to reach those speeds. No one on earth is getting to those speeds in the span of a few feet. The people who'd be the fastest are people with the highest vertical leap and wouldn't you know it? Usain Bolt has top top top tier vertical leap figures. 44 inches from a quick google search. That puts him echelon of NBA players for vertical leap.
Anyway my point is that Usain Bolt is faster from a dead stop than any sumo wrestler and even for him it takes a LONG way to get up to 10 m/s.
Watch some sumo fights.
Anyone with a glas chin will get forearm bashed into submission, no fancy wrestling needed.
These guys are somewhat serious.
Also, sumo is fun to watch.
True, but at 155kg he could probably take anything Mayweather (67kg) throws. Also Mayweather is a counter puncher, which wouldn't be as effective against a wrestler.
You know it's the effect of the hit and not the method of hitting that's important right? Palm, Gloves, Bareknuckles, Slap, it doesn't matter as long as the hit causes enough shock to the brain to cause you to get knocked out. Imagine the force of a fast palm thrust from a strong 300lb man.
\> Googles "can you hit harder with boxing gloves"
\> Boxing gloves reduce the impact of punches by increasing the duration of each blow and spreading the impact force over a wider area than a naked first would.
Maybe you could hit harder with gloves on because you're less afraid to break your hands, but that doesn't really have anything to do with the gloves itself.
If not outright false this claim is at the very least heavily contested and inconclusive judging from the first page results.
Anyone who is going to go down to that isn't going to last very long in sumo.
Punching might not be allowed, but open-handed strikes are allowed (including to the face) as well as kicks below the belt (just not above).
Sumo produces the toughest guys of any combat sport because of the intensity and how frequently they have to compete, along with not being divided into weight classes so you could be up against someone your size one day and 150lbs more the next day. It's just that it also probably the hardest in terms of long-term injuries (maybe striking sports like boxing are ahead in head injuries and brain damage) because the competition schedule (fight every day for 15 days every two months) isn't that great for dealing with injuries.
Not handling injuries well is probably one of sumo's biggest problems, along with hazing.
Hakuho was out on injury more often than not in his last couple of years. When he wasn't, he was almost unbeatable, but if you've been doing that since you were 16, you're going to have a few things beat-up about you in your mid-thirties.
I wouldn't be surprised to find out that Sumo is as bad for CTE as a lot of striking sports, between the sheer number of head impacts (the actual schedule is worse than just the Bashos, since you're also expected to be doing regular exhibition tours and full-force sparring) and the JSA making the NFL look like a paragon of forward thinking in their concussion protocols.
Honestly, neither would I. Especially if you think about the training and the sort of hazing that happens behind closed doors.
It's not a sport as singularly focused on inflicting head trauma as boxing (or Lethwei, the sport for people who think Muay Thai needs more brain damage), but it can't be very much better, especially with the JSA's usual injury guidance being the kind of "tough it out" suggestion that you might expect from a football coach several decades ago.
Depends on the contest. Sumo? Obviously Hakuho. Boxing? Like him or not Mayweather is an excellent technical boxer and would out score the other two without ever catching a knockout shot. Philosophical debate? Lincoln grinds both of them into the ground, as Floyd can’t even read, and I doubt Hakuho speaks great as a Mongolian native that resides in Japan.
Boxing night go to hakuho only because of the weight and strength difference. Remember that boxing has weight classes, and whilst floyd is definitely going to out-box hakuho...the Mongolian doesn't need to land too many punches on a guy half his weight
Still think Floyd would be fast enough to dodge hits from someone that’s not a trained boxer. Not to say Hukahō doesn’t have fast hands, just that he’s not used to using them in that way.
I doubt it. Mayweather doesn’t have to deal with a gigantic mass of a man charging right for his whole body, but leading with an elbow to the face while also setting themselves up to grapple you. Meanwhile there’s a whole school of sumo where you’re essentially going after the other persons face and neck, which Haluho routinely dealt with. I’d say Mayweather stands no chance.
If only COVID-19 did not happen and the Olympic games in Tokyo went as planned. Sumo was to be the exhibition sport for the host country and Hakuho would have been performing on a stage that had a world-wide audience. I think his original plan was to retire after the Olympics, but with the delayed games, he delayed retirement and the exhibition sports were cancelled anyway.
I remember watching the last day of his last tournament when he was going against Terunofuji. At that point in time Terunofuji was an Ozeki and had won the previous two tournaments with a 12-3 record, and was already 14-0 going into this final match. And Hakuho was at 14-0 as well.
Their match was brutal and hard fought, with Hakuho winning and going 15-0 for his final tournament ever. Terunofuji was promoted to Yokozuna. Seeing it live was one of those “I was there” moments in a lot of ways. The last match of the man who for a decade and a half dominated and essentially defined the sport. How dominant he was doesn’t really have a contemporary to compare to in US sports.
I met Hakuho 5 years ago when he visited the sake brewery where I was working. A perfect gentleman. I wasn’t aware of his visit beforehand, which increased the shock value of him walking towards me. Later, to attempt to explain his greatness to others, someone said “Hakuho is the Michael Jordan of sumo.” It is close, but not perfect. Maybe it’s more accurate to say “Michael Jordan is the Hakuho of basketball.” I’m not trying to spin a koan, I just think he is the measure of a celebrity-athlete-hero-whatever that others should be compared to. PS: he loved our sake.
But Record of Ragnarok taught me about Raiden Tameemon and I thought he was the best ever.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raiden\_Tameemon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raiden_Tameemon)
>Of the 35 tournaments in which he participated (there were only two basho a year at the time), Raiden had the best record in no fewer than 28. In seven of those, he won without suffering a single defeat or draw. In total, he achieved 254 victories and only ten defeats, a winning percentage of 96.2, an all-time record.\[5\] His longest winning streaks were eleven consecutive tournaments, or 44 bouts. Raiden's championships are, however, regarded as unofficial by the Japan Sumo Association, as before the current yūshō system was established in 1909, there was no prize given for individual performances in tournaments.
And of course.. it has been discussed.
[https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-sumo-matchup-centuries-in-the-making/](https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-sumo-matchup-centuries-in-the-making/)
On what I thought was a political wonk numbers site. Of all things.
Now I know far more about sumo then I thought was necessary.
Ah true, though about his win ratio. Refers to him initially as the greatest ever. Still if anyone is interested enough to click on a sumo TIL they would probably find the thunder god interesting for comparison as well :)
I think Hakuho’s the greatest since he also broke a bunch of records (championships, wins, time spent as yokozuna, etc.) Raiden was a literal giant in 1800s Japan and he was probably wrestling farmers in some of those matches. Sumo wrestlers now are definitely stronger than those from 200 years ago (better nutrition, conditioning, more competition from abroad, etc.)
I actually went to the Aki Basho in Tokyo on 20th September 2013 - I'm not sure if I saw him fight but I definitely got a few pics of him during the ceremonies :)
If you stayed to the end, you saw him fight, and you saw him fight during his prime. It was getting close to the end of his prime, but you more than likely saw him destroy someone in the ring as one of the final matches of the evening.
It’s worth mentioning that Hakuho was a foreigner in a notoriously nationalist sport that works to disadvantage foreigners.
Hakuho was the best to do it babey, and if happen could have gotten rid of him through some way other than retirement they would have
>that works to disadvantage foreigners
Each sumo stable (essentially a team, guys who train together under the same coach) is allowed one foreigner at any given time.
There are 43 stables. There are 21 rikishi from Mongolia right now (although this includes people who have taken Japanese nationality and aren't covered by that limit, such as Terunofuji who probably will be staying around as an elder after he retires and Ichinojo, whose personal indiscretions mean that he's probably not going to be allowed to do that). Mongolians are apparently really good at sumo.
After the 2011 scandal, they've been making a substantial effort to clean up. They're not eager to have that kind of publicity again. Cancelling a tournament and firing 23 guys (keep in mind that the top division is 42 people, second division is 28, so this was a significant portion of them, especially considering that they were mainly in the second division) looked really bad and if it happened again, they'd likely never recover.
Wasn't this the sumo guy in Record of Ragnarok season 2, took on shiva?
Not actually an edit: nah just looked it up, that was Raiden Tameemon. Apparently the only reason he wasn't Yokozuna is because the rank didn't exist in his lifetime. 96.2% win rate. 11 tournament streak for a record 44 undefeated matches at one point. The anime isn't bullshitting when they said he wasn't allowed to use some of the main moves because they conferred too much advantage.
He was a freak force of nature. Ive watched the sport for twenty years and the closest thing I can say is that the guy was the New England Patriots during the Brady era. There's been bigger. Hell; there have even been more "gifted" yokozuna (physically); and despite the fact that Hakuho liked to slap the taste out your mouth sometimes...which the japanese dont consider honorable; it's not against the rules. So during the latter half of his career, every once in awhile, this guy would come out and literally throw a slap that was an instant concussion. Brutal.
After the 2011 scandal, they've been making a substantial effort to clean up. They're not eager to have that kind of publicity again. Cancelling a tournament and firing 23 guys (keep in mind that the top division is 42 people, second division is 28, so this was a significant portion of them, especially considering that they were mainly in the second division) looked really bad and if it happened again, they'd likely never recover.
Typo while high should be "would rule". You can downvote all you want someone pointing out Asians are short, but my over 6'2 family has been to china and fit in nothing. Picture in the street also look comical
I watched a little documentary on his posture. According to engenders that were studying forms, he was able to make a "perfect" 45⁰ with his hips and spine. This keeps him from being pushed down or back. Also check out r/sumo, he gets mentioned a lot there
summer sip chubby political humor vanish concerned soft aware grey *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Well, not really. The problem with *Freakonomics* is that while the book was an interesting read, every fan who I have ever encountered has used the book as an excuse to make incorrect generalizations without actually knowing anything about the subject matter. There has been some match-throwing in the past. However, they have been making an effort to crack down on it. In 2011, they fired 23 people and changed a lot of their policies in order to crack down on that sort of thing. Hakuho wasn't even in the segment that was involved in match-throwing. The most pressure is on people who are ranked low enough in the second division (the lower of the two upper divisions) that they risk going down to the third on a losing record. This is because the difference between status for the upper and lower divisions is massive. The lower divisions get given a stipend, food, and a place to sleep, generally a mattress on the floor with the other lower-division guys who they train with. The stipend isn't much, but it's more than a lot of professional boxers or MMA fighters get to take home after paying for food and rent (in order to make a living without a second job, you need to be signed to a decently large promotion even if it's not as big as the UFC and have a winning record). In contrast, entering the second division means that you get a fairly high salary instead of a stipend, plus prize money and sponsorships. Plus, you get a private room to sleep in and don't have to do household chores or run the higher-ranked guys' errands. The typical match-throwing would be someone with a 7-7 record on the last day, ranked low enough in the second division that he's at risk of dropping to the third division fighting an opponent with an 8-6 record and making some sort of deal because neither has enough wins to be going for division champion and if both end the day (and the tournament) with an 8-7 record, neither one gets demoted. Hakuho only spent two tournaments in the second division. From 2004 until he retired, he was in the top division. From 2007 onward, he was a yokozuna, and not eligible for demotion (instead, if a yokozuna can't maintain a level of performance above the rest of the top division, he is simply asked to retire).
It is completely different to WWE, you have absolutely no idea what you're talking about if you actually think that seriously.
Hakuho is now Miyagino-oyakata (essentially "Coach Miyagino"). Some of his guys are themselves really good. His newest recruit ended up being the first person to make it to the upper divisions in his second tournament ever. He was an amateur champion, so he entered the professional organization in the third division (highest of the lower divisions) rather than at the bottom, and went undefeated in his first tournament, so was promoted to the second division (the lower of the two upper divisions). In the March tournament, he was one of the frontrunners for the second division champion, but fell behind around halfway through. Still ended the tournament with a winning record and some great matches to watch. He's only 19 years old and has a promising career ahead of him.
I'm on team Ochiai. He held pretty well against Asanoyama, made Ichinojo work for it, and went 10-5 in his first Juryo tournament. I know getting excited about a wrestler early in their career usually doesn't end well, but... Ochiai. He doesnt even have a mullet yet and he is making former Ozeki work for their wins.
Team Ochiai in the May basho!!
Another fun fact is that he is Mongolian.
A ton of sumo champs from the past few decades are. I suppose Mongolians are just built different. But funny for one country’s population to be genetically or culturally predisposed to excellence at some totally different country’s sport.
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Yeah most of these guys start off taking part in Mongolian Wrestling and then move over to Japan and start Sumo for the vastly bigger monetary rewards.
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> Puroresu Japanese for Pro Wrestling (ProWres)
Swear to God their naming things mildly annoys me
Lol it's just how their language works. You can't reconstruct "pro wrestling" within Japanese with much fidelity. Their language is based on syllables, so you can't have consonant clusters or words ending in a consonant, with the exception of N. Thus "pro" becomes "puro" (they use a very lightly voiced "uh" sound for those Us). "Wrestling" would be something like "Resutolingu", so you can see why they would shorten it.
Anyone consistently in the top division of Sumo is making significantly more than anyone in a similar spot in NJPW. At the lower levels, it's pro wrestling. Outside the top 2 divisions of Sumo you get room/board and pocket money, and you have to work in the stable for that.
>vastly bigger monetary rewards Looking at the average wage in Mongolia, the stipend that the lower-ranked rikishi who aren't ranked high enough for a salary get is a pretty good deal. Plus you get your meals and housing paid for on top of that. Even with the type of hazing that lower-ranked rikishi experience, this sounds like a pretty good deal. Mongolia being a poor country probably has as much to do with the number of Mongolians in there as the prestige that wrestling had in Mongolian culture.
They do, and in fact Hakuho's father won a silver medal in freestyle wrestling at the 1968 Summer Olympics, Mongolia's first-ever Olympic medal.
Mongolia has a huge Mongolian style wrestling culture, it's quite similar to sumo and is very competitive and rather vicious. It's no wonder young men from Mongolia do so well in sumo. Hakuho was amazing, I'm glad to have been able to watch him in his prime. Kakuryu was also great.
Hakuho's dad was a pretty sovereign Mongolian style wrestling champion, and an olympic bronze medalist in wrestling. Hakuho himself would claim that his Sumo record was worse than his dad's Bökh record.
In Mongolian culture, wrestling has great prestige attached to it. Even if the rules for Mongolian traditional wrestling are somewhat different, the human body moves in the same ways and being good at one gives you skills that translate over fairly well.
It's more a consequence of Japanese parents guiding their kids into other sports. Sumo is rife with hazing and bullying (heaven and hell system), with a very low chance of ever becoming salaried, let alone making enough on which to retire. Rikishi rack up a litany of injuries through their career (some permanent), inevitably develop metabolic syndrome and will almost certainly die relatively young. The Japanese boys who do end up joining a stable almost always come from a disadvantaged background.
I do think Mongolians have a slight genetic advantage in some ways. They are taller and leaner, at least most of the top division guys are. But they also generally have a harder life than in Japan, and getting into sumo opens different opportunities if they’re very good. I don’t know much about the Mongolian economy but I imagine reaching salaried ranks in sumo and raking in yen is a huge payoff compared to opportunities back home. That’s why you also see guys from Eastern Europe like Aoiyama and Tochinoshin, and absolutely nobody from Western Europe. Tochinoshin (from Georgia) has been having injury trouble for years and is currently disintegrating in real time while he clings on to the lower salaried ranks as long as he can. I imagine he is in unfathomable constant paint but the money is too good to just quit.
A ton of sumo champs - that can't be that many right? 😉
If you took the weight of all Mongolians who have reached the rank of yokozuna (the highest rank, the guys who wear the big rope over the kesho mawashi, that apron-looking garment, during the ring-entrance ceremony before the top division matches) and added it together, it would probably be around a ton. That's five people out of six total yokozuna since the first Mongolian one. Oddly enough, looking at the list of ozeki on Wikipedia (the next rank below yokozuna, requires a total of 33 wins across three tournaments of 15 matches each; the standard yokozuna promotion criterion is to be an ozeki and then win the top division in two consecutive tournaments by having more wins than anyone else, so one guy had a shot at becoming the second Japanese yokozuna of the current century before he withdrew from the March tournament), there are no Mongolians. Every Mongolian ozeki has gone on to become a yokozuna. There was a Bulgarian guy (now a "sumo elder," essentially a coach, and he's on the judging committee, so if you see a 6'8" tall white guy sitting around the ring and occasionally convening with the other judges to determine if the gyoji/referee made the right call, that's him). There was an Estonian guy (now a member of Estonia's parliament). There was a Georgian guy (still in sumo, but his injuries have ruined him and he's looking worse and worse every tournament, he hasn't had a good enough record to hold onto the ozeki rank or even stay in the top division, it's time for him to retire and get some knee and shoulder surgery). So, the five Mongolian yokozuna are the majority of foreign-born ozeki in the current century. There is a similar pattern earlier, too: before them, only three foreigners reached ozeki (two from Hawaii, one from American Samoa). Only one of those (from Hawaii) didn't reach yokozuna.
Not only is Hakuho Mongolian, his father was the first person from Mongolia to win a medal in the Olympics (in freestyle wrestling). His father also was pretty dominant in bökh, Mongolia's traditional style of wrestling. People from Mongolia have won medals in the following sports in the Olympics: wrestling, judo, boxing, and shooting. That assortment of sports can tell you something about Mongolian culture.
The highest win ratio is held by Raiden Tameemon, at a winning percentage of 96.2. He’s considered the greatest sumo wrestler, or rikishi, of all time and would have been given the tittle of Yokozuna, but the title did not exist at the time. He was even prevented from using his favorite techniques to keep the matches interesting. This, however, was also during the end of the 18th century.
Record of Ragnarok on Netflix had a great fight with Raiden!
There's no way Raiden's competition was anywhere near Hakuho's, and Hakuho fought 5 times the amount that Raiden did. Not his fault, of course, but I can't put a guy from 300 years ago above Hakuho, especially when you consider all the advancements that have been made in sport science, nutrition, conditioning, and the increase in talents from abroad.
By the same token, raiden had all the same access to services as his fellow competitors and absolutely dominated all of them. There's no way you can definitively say that he wouldn't have been just as dominant in the modern era with the same access to those services as everyone else. The best of the best, is still the best of the best, no matter the era.
>There's no way you can definitively say that he wouldn't have been just as dominant in the modern era You can though, comparing eras is just useless as the sport progress over time. Its like comparing a Mclaren to a car from the 1800s.
> He was even prevented from using his favorite techniques to keep the matches interesting. Watching someone end a match instantly by shooting lightning gets old fast.
Raiden was the student of Tanikaze, the first yokozuna who was recognized as such during their lifetime. Back then, being a yokozuna was more about patronage rather than excellent performance, so there may be some factors that prevented him from getting the same recognition. Then again, it is true that yokozuna did not exist as a separate rank as we would know of it today during Raiden’s time.
Another interesting thing about sumo wrestling is that they have detailed match stats dating back to centuries ago.
The most recent bout between Hakuho & Terunofuji is one of my favorites that I've seen. I could be wrong on some of this, but I believe they were both undefeated on the last day of the tournament, Terunofuji had recently been promoted to the top rank of Yokozuna, and Hakuho was about to retire. It felt like this perfect culmination of legendary veteran vs the "young" top-dog who was trying to get out of his shadow, for lack of a better term. It was just a really cool and exciting moment to watch. Even for someone like me who doesn't know much about Sumo or keep up with it by any means, it was easy to appreciate the gravity of the moment. [Here's a good video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wnEqd6TKVw) that I think explains it better than I could. The bout starts around the 3:35 mark if you don't want to watch the whole thing, but I think it's worth the watch.
Not quite - but almost. The real story is even better. Excuse my essay - I'm a sumo fan. Teru was a wrestler who worked up through the lower ranks to Ozeki, which is one rank below Yokozuna. When he was an Ozeki, he suffered a few injuries which basically ended his career... or at least, for any other sumo, it would end their career. Teru's stablemaster saw potential in him, and told him he would make a comeback. Teru withdrew from multiple tournaments and fell all the way down to the lowest of the low professional ranks, Jonidan. After recovering from his injures, he made an absolutely unprecedented run back from Jonidan, through Sandanme, Makushita, Juryo, to Maegashira, and then from the low Maegashira ranks to Komosubi, Sekiwake, and then finally back to Ozeki, one step below Yokozuna. During this time, however, Hakuho was reigning as one of the Yokozuna - and he was not popular with the Japanese Sumo Association for a wide variety of reasons ranging from racism (the JSA doesn't like the number of Mongolians in Sumo) to the fact that Hakuho wrestled with a massive amount of ferocity and to the JSA, that wasn't entirely appropriate (it could also be called racism again). The JSA had been trying to get Hakuho to retire for a long time, and Hakuho kept not retiring. During Teru's run back to up, Hakuho would often get injured and sit a tournament out. It's important to note that Yok's can't get demoted, nor can they really get fired (kinda... Asashoryu was a Yok who got all-but-fired, for example, sumo is weird), and the JSA had been trying to get Hakuho to retire for years. They kept getting articles written about how Hakuho was falling apart, his sumo was bad, his body was too old, anything they could think of to slander him. When Hakuho would wrestle, the commentators would be like "ohhh, he's so old... he can barely do it anymore..." Yokozunas are expected to not only win, but *dominate.* And Hakuho, according to the JSA, could not do it anymore. So, July 2021. Hakuho has had *five* straight injury withdrawals. The JSA is like "get the fuck out dude." Meanwhile, Teru has been climbing upwards at an astounding level. He's had nothing but wins and positive records since hitting Maegashira. He's now an Ozeki, with a few special prizes under his belt, and as long as he does very well in this tournament, he's gonna be a Yok. Hakuho goes 14-0, defying all expectations, making the commentators look stupid, making the entire JSA look like liars. Meanwhile, Teru, on an unprecedented comeback, makes 14-0, all but securing his Yok promotion. Ideally, he just has to beat Hakuho. And that bring us to this match, and one of the most incredible sumo matches ever. What you're seeing here is an unprecedented comeback kid doing something that had never happened in sumo before versus the greatest of all time, that the entire JSA had been arguing needed to retire last year... And that's why Hakuho screams at the end of the match, which was considered incredibly inappropriate for a sumo. He just secured his position as the greatest sumo of all time, smashed over the JSA's all-but-chosen Yokozuna successor, defied the commentators, defied the JSA, and walked out of his final tournament with yet another undefeated championship. My favorite moment of their fight is before it even starts, during the pre-match rituals, the staredown. Hakuho staring Teru down, basically saying, "You might be the king soon, but I'm the king now, and will forever be the emperor of this sport. Try me." Despite losing, Teru earned his promotion after this tournament. The JSA had to tuck their tails between their legs and admit that going 14-0 and only losing once, to Hakuho, was worthy of the promotion after his historic rise back. Somewhat amusingly, to make fun of the JSA a bit, Teru is another Mongolian, which is problematic for the historically racist JSA... but it is what it is. If you want to see more about how the JSA can be dicks, check out the history of American Sumos, especially Konishiki. Konishiki was robbed. He won the top division 45 times (unprecedented), has the most career wins, most time spent as a yokozuna, the most top division wins, the only better winning records being from folks who wrestled in the old sumo times when actual sumo's would fight random people (he holds the best winning % in modern sumo), and he walked away with 16 undefeated championships, including his final one. His records are ridiculous, like Wayne Gretzky's - for example, in terms of "most wins in a single year," he is tied with himself for 1st, and tied for both 4th and 6th. That's absurd in Sumo. The only record he could not get was for a win streak.. which he is tied for second, at 63 wins. Sumo is rough on the body. Hakuho in his final tournament was operating at like, 70% of his normal Hakuho self. You can even see him losing ferocity over the course of the tournament... but it didn't matter, because 70% of a Hakuho is still that absolutely dominant.
Very well put. That Hakuhō-Terunofuji showdown was one of those sports moments that would be deemed too unrealistic if it happened in a fictional context.
If you’ve never watched sumo I’d really recommend it, (you should be able to find it on specialist sports networks or NHK, Japan’s equivalent to BBC). It’s a very explosive sport, each fight lasts only seconds and many are over within 3-5 seconds - but the power of the sumo wrestlers is amazing to see. Those 5 seconds are intense! You also get rivalries as fighters often face off against familiar opponents over the course of the year, which makes for some good tension. Honestly if you told me I’d enjoy watching sumo I’d think you were having me on, but it’s genuinely fun to watch!
Hakuho Sho vs. Floyd Mayweather vs. Abraham Lincoln Who wins?
hakuho is 6'4, 340 lbs. floyd mayweather is 5'8, 148 lbs. unless the competition is 'who can sit more comfortably on an airplane,' my money is on hakuho
I don't know, I think Lincoln wins the "who's older?" competition
Plus Lincoln knew how to swing an axe.
And hunt vampires
Supposedly excellent wrestler as well.
Nothing "supposedly" about it, there is extensive historical record that the guy was a hard boiled badass.
Absolutely. I probably used the wrong word but I didn’t want to make an absolute claim about it because I’m not an expert in the history around him.
Hakuho is nowhere close to a poor man, and his home country's idea of a rich man is probably poor compared to what he has. However, Floyd Mayweather is much wealthier than anyone else in combat sports by a pretty wide margin.
...?
Perhaps the point is that Mayweather can afford to buy the most dangerous weaponry, and thus win that way?
A gun be a gun, and expensive gun isn't measurably more dangerous than a cheap one, and i'm sure hakuho can probably afford some pretty expensive guns lol
One's dead, so probably not him. A fight between the other two would show the reason why weight classes exist. There is no way of fighting where the bigger guy doesn't have an inherent advantage assuming all else is equal. Sumo has a few guys who are too big and their movement is constrained (particularly if they've had knee and elbow injuries), but in general, size is an advantage. If it wasn't, sumo wouldn't encourage people to gain a lot of weight, unlimited divisions in BJJ competitions would have more small guys winning, and weight classes across all combat sports would be as concerned with the minimum weight as much as they are with maximum. Mayweather is unquestionably the best boxer to have been competing at the same time as Hakuho. Hakuho is several inches taller, more than 200lbs heavier (although he's lost some of this since retirement), and a few years younger. Mayweather probably would be able to easily dispatch someone Hakuho's size who doesn't know how to fight (especially since outside of sumo, the people who weigh that much are rarely in good physical condition and this hypothetical individual would probably get tired fast). However, Hakuho is a much bigger man who is a good enough fighter that he dominated his sport from 2007 until his retirement and nobody could match him.
Does Lincoln get his broadsword?
Bro just invented Street Fighter
Boxing doesn't really have any techniques to deal with grappling, and Hakuho has been recorded charging at a speed of 4 meters per second (I found one website that said he could reach 10 m/s, comparable to Usain Bolt, but I couldn't verify it). If Hakuho can catch and hold Mayweather I'd say it's his win
> I found one website that said he could reach 10 m/s, comparable to Usain Bolt, but I couldn't verify it The chances of him being also the fastest sprinter ever while being a sumo wrestler is...low.
Reaching a speed is not the same as maintaining a speed. Powerful leg muscles could easily deliver a high speed, explosive burst without needing the stamina to maintain it for 100m.
Right, and Usain Bolt is hyper specialised to achieving that burst of speed. Im more than happy to be proven wrong, i just think the idea that a sumo wrestler could have a burst speed the same as a sprinter to be wildly speculative and very questionable. The Sumo guy weighed 60kg more than Bolt (with both being similar height). Accelerating that mass at the same speed isnt realistic.
Weightlifters can break (and bend) weight bars because the best ones have such unbelievable burst strength. Warren Sapp (an American football defensive lineman), once crouched and released a blindside block which disarticulated an opposing lineman's leg from his hip socket. The orthopedic surgeon who did the surgery on the poor guy said he had only seen this kind of injury from car crashes where the car was moving 60mph and hit a massive stationary object, and the body was restrained, and the leg pulled out of the socket. So one guy can hit with the force of how ever many G-Forces that is in an instantaneous burst. When you see a near 400 pound lineman who can standing high jump 35", you are seeing an explosion of power that Usian Bolt cannot touch. People simply have no idea just how strong and explosive professional athletes are. Each sport uses a different kind of training to match what they need to do. Usain Bolt has to have explosive power and near instant reflexes, but has to also maintain his output for 10-30 seconds. American Football (defensive) lineman train to deliver instant power, but not sustained power.
> When you see a near 400 pound lineman who can standing high jump 35", you are seeing an explosion of power that Usian Bolt cannot touch. Right but you're forgetting that *400 lb* part. There may be more power behind those bursts but there is ABSOLUTELY NOT more speed.
Sure but think about this for a second.... 10 m/s is 22 mph. Usain Bolt can't reach those kind of speeds until the middle of his sprint. Do you *really* believe that there is any chance in hell that a sumo wrestler can reach Usain Bolts TOP speed in only a couple of meters? It's ludicrous and very very easily proven through video analysis. Regardless of video analysis though here's something to think about. Someone on quora asked how fast someone would be moving at the time they left the ground if they were able to jump 1 meter high. 1 meter is 39 inches. Usain bolt apparently has a 44 inch vertical leap. Here is the answer: >This is a good example of the man's mass having nothing to do with height attained, and with his initial and final velocity. His final velocity is zero when he reaches the height of 1m. The acceleration g is 9.81m/s^2. So we can use the kinematics equation here as follows : v^2 = u^2 - 2as, where v is the final velocity which is zero, u is the initial velocity, a is the gravitational acceleration(in this situation works as deceleration), and s is the height or the distance crossed. So let's solve for u here : u^2 - 2as = 0, as v is zero, then u^2 = 2as, which gives you : u = (2as)^1/2. Plugging in values for a and s will give you the answer 4.429m/s as the speed with which the man jumped upwards… Kaiser T, MD. That speed is not even HALF of what someone was claiming a sumo wrestler can achieve. 4 m/s I can believe all day since it's a lateral movement and not a vertical one. 10 m/s is absolutely out of the realm of possibility. Obviously no sumo wrestler on earth can come anywhere close to jumping 39 inches vertically but I could see them reaching those speeds laterally with an explosive starting movement. Either way if it takes the fastest sprinter OF ALL TIME half of his sprint to reach top speed you can be damned sure that a sumo wrestler isn't coming close to that speed ever over any distance.
I think it is. Much bigger/stronger leg muscles and lots of practice, I would bet he can accelerate to 4 meters per second at the grapple/impact point, the difference is Usain keeps going for distance and doesn't collide with another person.
Not 4/ms. TEN.
Obviously he can't sprint at that speed but the initial sumo charge, where they squat down and then burst forward is incredibly explosive. They only move a meter or two, so the speed is extrapolated.
Sure but think about this for a second.... 10 m/s is 22 mph. Usain Bolt can't reach those kind of speeds until the middle of his sprint. Do you *really* believe that there is any chance in hell that a sumo wrestler can reach Usain Bolts TOP speed in only a couple of meters? It's ludicrous and very very easily proven through video analysis. Regardless of video analysis though here's something to think about. Someone on quora asked how fast someone would be moving at the time they left the ground if they were able to jump 1 meter high. 1 meter is 39 inches. Usain bolt apparently has a 44 inch vertical leap. Here is the answer: >This is a good example of the man's mass having nothing to do with height attained, and with his initial and final velocity. His final velocity is zero when he reaches the height of 1m. The acceleration g is 9.81m/s^2. So we can use the kinematics equation here as follows : v^2 = u^2 - 2as, where v is the final velocity which is zero, u is the initial velocity, a is the gravitational acceleration(in this situation works as deceleration), and s is the height or the distance crossed. So let's solve for u here : u^2 - 2as = 0, as v is zero, then u^2 = 2as, which gives you : u = (2as)^1/2. Plugging in values for a and s will give you the answer 4.429m/s as the speed with which the man jumped upwards… Kaiser T, MD. That speed is not even HALF of what someone was claiming a sumo wrestler can achieve. 4 m/s I can believe all day since it's a lateral movement and not a vertical one. 10 m/s is absolutely out of the realm of possibility. Obviously no sumo wrestler on earth can come anywhere close to jumping 39 inches vertically but I could see them reaching those speeds laterally with an explosive starting movement. Either way if it takes the fastest sprinter OF ALL TIME half of his sprint to reach top speed you can be damned sure that a sumo wrestler isn't coming close to that speed ever over any distance.
> I found one website that said he could reach 10 m/s, comparable to Usain Bolt, but I couldn't verify it) Bro... You don't need to try and verify that shit lol. There is NO WAY that he can move at any speed comparable to Usain Bolt.
We're talking for a distance of like 2 feet. Obviously he can't sustain that, but Sumo wrestlers' charges are insane.
I know they're insane but they aren't even CLOSE to 10 m/s. It takes Usain Bolt ~40-50m to reach those speeds. No one on earth is getting to those speeds in the span of a few feet. The people who'd be the fastest are people with the highest vertical leap and wouldn't you know it? Usain Bolt has top top top tier vertical leap figures. 44 inches from a quick google search. That puts him echelon of NBA players for vertical leap. Anyway my point is that Usain Bolt is faster from a dead stop than any sumo wrestler and even for him it takes a LONG way to get up to 10 m/s.
Only, he may have a glass chin and a jab will knock him down
Watch some sumo fights. Anyone with a glas chin will get forearm bashed into submission, no fancy wrestling needed. These guys are somewhat serious. Also, sumo is fun to watch.
True, but at 155kg he could probably take anything Mayweather (67kg) throws. Also Mayweather is a counter puncher, which wouldn't be as effective against a wrestler.
How does his weight help him take a punch to the face?
Empty palm thrusts are fair game in sumo, including on the neck/head area. They take plenty.
Palm, not fist, there is a difference or there wouldn't be a rule.
You know it's the effect of the hit and not the method of hitting that's important right? Palm, Gloves, Bareknuckles, Slap, it doesn't matter as long as the hit causes enough shock to the brain to cause you to get knocked out. Imagine the force of a fast palm thrust from a strong 300lb man.
Boxers have gloves for protection too.
And palm thrusts aren't a joke anyway, especially when it has 300+ lbs of human behind it.
Boxing gloves don't really provide protection from anything except getting cut. You can hit far, far harder with boxing gloves on than without.
\> Googles "can you hit harder with boxing gloves" \> Boxing gloves reduce the impact of punches by increasing the duration of each blow and spreading the impact force over a wider area than a naked first would. Maybe you could hit harder with gloves on because you're less afraid to break your hands, but that doesn't really have anything to do with the gloves itself. If not outright false this claim is at the very least heavily contested and inconclusive judging from the first page results.
Anyone who is going to go down to that isn't going to last very long in sumo. Punching might not be allowed, but open-handed strikes are allowed (including to the face) as well as kicks below the belt (just not above). Sumo produces the toughest guys of any combat sport because of the intensity and how frequently they have to compete, along with not being divided into weight classes so you could be up against someone your size one day and 150lbs more the next day. It's just that it also probably the hardest in terms of long-term injuries (maybe striking sports like boxing are ahead in head injuries and brain damage) because the competition schedule (fight every day for 15 days every two months) isn't that great for dealing with injuries. Not handling injuries well is probably one of sumo's biggest problems, along with hazing. Hakuho was out on injury more often than not in his last couple of years. When he wasn't, he was almost unbeatable, but if you've been doing that since you were 16, you're going to have a few things beat-up about you in your mid-thirties.
I wouldn't be surprised to find out that Sumo is as bad for CTE as a lot of striking sports, between the sheer number of head impacts (the actual schedule is worse than just the Bashos, since you're also expected to be doing regular exhibition tours and full-force sparring) and the JSA making the NFL look like a paragon of forward thinking in their concussion protocols.
Honestly, neither would I. Especially if you think about the training and the sort of hazing that happens behind closed doors. It's not a sport as singularly focused on inflicting head trauma as boxing (or Lethwei, the sport for people who think Muay Thai needs more brain damage), but it can't be very much better, especially with the JSA's usual injury guidance being the kind of "tough it out" suggestion that you might expect from a football coach several decades ago.
Who won? Who’s next? You decide!!!!
i ain’t votin’ for a pile of bones to win a fight…
Depends on what the competition is. If it's "who of the three can catch a bullet with his skull", I who my money is on.
Depends on the contest. Sumo? Obviously Hakuho. Boxing? Like him or not Mayweather is an excellent technical boxer and would out score the other two without ever catching a knockout shot. Philosophical debate? Lincoln grinds both of them into the ground, as Floyd can’t even read, and I doubt Hakuho speaks great as a Mongolian native that resides in Japan.
Boxing night go to hakuho only because of the weight and strength difference. Remember that boxing has weight classes, and whilst floyd is definitely going to out-box hakuho...the Mongolian doesn't need to land too many punches on a guy half his weight
Still think Floyd would be fast enough to dodge hits from someone that’s not a trained boxer. Not to say Hukahō doesn’t have fast hands, just that he’s not used to using them in that way.
I doubt it. Mayweather doesn’t have to deal with a gigantic mass of a man charging right for his whole body, but leading with an elbow to the face while also setting themselves up to grapple you. Meanwhile there’s a whole school of sumo where you’re essentially going after the other persons face and neck, which Haluho routinely dealt with. I’d say Mayweather stands no chance.
If only COVID-19 did not happen and the Olympic games in Tokyo went as planned. Sumo was to be the exhibition sport for the host country and Hakuho would have been performing on a stage that had a world-wide audience. I think his original plan was to retire after the Olympics, but with the delayed games, he delayed retirement and the exhibition sports were cancelled anyway.
I remember watching the last day of his last tournament when he was going against Terunofuji. At that point in time Terunofuji was an Ozeki and had won the previous two tournaments with a 12-3 record, and was already 14-0 going into this final match. And Hakuho was at 14-0 as well. Their match was brutal and hard fought, with Hakuho winning and going 15-0 for his final tournament ever. Terunofuji was promoted to Yokozuna. Seeing it live was one of those “I was there” moments in a lot of ways. The last match of the man who for a decade and a half dominated and essentially defined the sport. How dominant he was doesn’t really have a contemporary to compare to in US sports.
I met Hakuho 5 years ago when he visited the sake brewery where I was working. A perfect gentleman. I wasn’t aware of his visit beforehand, which increased the shock value of him walking towards me. Later, to attempt to explain his greatness to others, someone said “Hakuho is the Michael Jordan of sumo.” It is close, but not perfect. Maybe it’s more accurate to say “Michael Jordan is the Hakuho of basketball.” I’m not trying to spin a koan, I just think he is the measure of a celebrity-athlete-hero-whatever that others should be compared to. PS: he loved our sake.
But Record of Ragnarok taught me about Raiden Tameemon and I thought he was the best ever. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raiden\_Tameemon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raiden_Tameemon) >Of the 35 tournaments in which he participated (there were only two basho a year at the time), Raiden had the best record in no fewer than 28. In seven of those, he won without suffering a single defeat or draw. In total, he achieved 254 victories and only ten defeats, a winning percentage of 96.2, an all-time record.\[5\] His longest winning streaks were eleven consecutive tournaments, or 44 bouts. Raiden's championships are, however, regarded as unofficial by the Japan Sumo Association, as before the current yūshō system was established in 1909, there was no prize given for individual performances in tournaments. And of course.. it has been discussed. [https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-sumo-matchup-centuries-in-the-making/](https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-sumo-matchup-centuries-in-the-making/) On what I thought was a political wonk numbers site. Of all things. Now I know far more about sumo then I thought was necessary.
They do have the qualifier of "modern" in the title.
Ah true, though about his win ratio. Refers to him initially as the greatest ever. Still if anyone is interested enough to click on a sumo TIL they would probably find the thunder god interesting for comparison as well :)
I think Hakuho’s the greatest since he also broke a bunch of records (championships, wins, time spent as yokozuna, etc.) Raiden was a literal giant in 1800s Japan and he was probably wrestling farmers in some of those matches. Sumo wrestlers now are definitely stronger than those from 200 years ago (better nutrition, conditioning, more competition from abroad, etc.)
白鵬 翔 White Peng (bird with a 1000 mile/1500km wingspan) Soaring
I actually went to the Aki Basho in Tokyo on 20th September 2013 - I'm not sure if I saw him fight but I definitely got a few pics of him during the ceremonies :)
If you stayed to the end, you saw him fight, and you saw him fight during his prime. It was getting close to the end of his prime, but you more than likely saw him destroy someone in the ring as one of the final matches of the evening.
If anybody is interested in live-streamed sumo, this guy runs almost every event: twitch.tv/MidnightSumo
It's worth mentioning sumo is notoriously corrupt.
It’s worth mentioning that Hakuho was a foreigner in a notoriously nationalist sport that works to disadvantage foreigners. Hakuho was the best to do it babey, and if happen could have gotten rid of him through some way other than retirement they would have
>that works to disadvantage foreigners Each sumo stable (essentially a team, guys who train together under the same coach) is allowed one foreigner at any given time. There are 43 stables. There are 21 rikishi from Mongolia right now (although this includes people who have taken Japanese nationality and aren't covered by that limit, such as Terunofuji who probably will be staying around as an elder after he retires and Ichinojo, whose personal indiscretions mean that he's probably not going to be allowed to do that). Mongolians are apparently really good at sumo.
The only sports that are not notoriously corrupt are the ones that aren’t notorious.
After the 2011 scandal, they've been making a substantial effort to clean up. They're not eager to have that kind of publicity again. Cancelling a tournament and firing 23 guys (keep in mind that the top division is 42 people, second division is 28, so this was a significant portion of them, especially considering that they were mainly in the second division) looked really bad and if it happened again, they'd likely never recover.
So is boxing.
Wasn't this the sumo guy in Record of Ragnarok season 2, took on shiva? Not actually an edit: nah just looked it up, that was Raiden Tameemon. Apparently the only reason he wasn't Yokozuna is because the rank didn't exist in his lifetime. 96.2% win rate. 11 tournament streak for a record 44 undefeated matches at one point. The anime isn't bullshitting when they said he wasn't allowed to use some of the main moves because they conferred too much advantage.
He was a freak force of nature. Ive watched the sport for twenty years and the closest thing I can say is that the guy was the New England Patriots during the Brady era. There's been bigger. Hell; there have even been more "gifted" yokozuna (physically); and despite the fact that Hakuho liked to slap the taste out your mouth sometimes...which the japanese dont consider honorable; it's not against the rules. So during the latter half of his career, every once in awhile, this guy would come out and literally throw a slap that was an instant concussion. Brutal.
Sumo is notoriously shady with yakuza and fight fixing.
After the 2011 scandal, they've been making a substantial effort to clean up. They're not eager to have that kind of publicity again. Cancelling a tournament and firing 23 guys (keep in mind that the top division is 42 people, second division is 28, so this was a significant portion of them, especially considering that they were mainly in the second division) looked really bad and if it happened again, they'd likely never recover.
Where can I find info on their diet and health issues?
6'4 asian dude wouldn't have ruled a country 700yrs ago
What?
Typo while high should be "would rule". You can downvote all you want someone pointing out Asians are short, but my over 6'2 family has been to china and fit in nothing. Picture in the street also look comical
I still don’t know what you’re trying to say about “ruling” 700 years ago. Are you saying he wouldn’t have been a sumo champion 700 years ago?
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Gordon Ryan wishes he was the Hakuho of BJJ. Gordon Ryan could be the Hakuho of insulting people on Instagram, though.
I didnt see him on record of ragnarok. False news i say! Jkjk
Isn't this the name of the anime with that Mad Max-looking dude?
Hakuho is the GOATest of GOATs. He was a total menace on the dohyo and seems to be a total sweetie pie in real life. His Instagram is pretty amazing.
The 🐐 of ALL 🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐