2026 Hatsu banzuke prediction + prize giveaway result

Predicting the 2025 Hatsu basho banzuke ahead of Grand Sumo's January tournament.

Hey all!

I’m taking a break from my final assignments and exam prep to do something fun… playing Nostradamus with the next banzuke. I’ve done pretty well with these lately, but you have to stay humble with these things. I’m sure I’m going to totally biff one at some point soon.

Before I get to my prognostications, though, I have a winner to announce!

Annual subscriber Kelly is the winner of the ‘Salty’ Hōshōryū sweatshirt, courtesy of Cheeky Sumo.

This beauty is going up to Canada. My fellow Canadians have a great record with these giveaways. This is the second draw in a row that went to a Canadian and, I think, third overall. I’m not playing favourites, though!

Here’s how I got Kelly as our winner.

First I exported a list of all my paid subscribers into a spreadsheet. Then I copy and pasted the entries based on their subscription tier. Annual subscribers were copied and pasted six times and founding subscribers were copied and pasted fifteen times. Monthly subscribers had just one single entry each.

That gave me 692 lines of data. I ran a random number generator and got 652.

That number corresponded with one of Kelly’s six rows on the spreadsheet.

Congrats Kelly! Hope you enjoy the sweater.

If you’d like to pick one up yourself, head over to www.CheekySumo.com now.

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OK, from one table of names to another. But before the banzuke prediction, here’s a bonus gif!

No mysteries over where I’m going!

Before I get into my prediction, here’s a brief overview of how the banzuke is usually constructed.

The general rule is that wrestlers move up and down based on their net wins or losses from the past basho. That means that a wrestler who went 8-7 has a net score of +1. That means they are probably going to move up one space. However, we can’t assume that’s the case for everyone. Context matters. And, also, sometimes you just have to stick guys somewhere that more or less makes sense.

For reference, here’s the real Kyushu banzuke. I’ve added columns here for the win-loss records from the basho, as well as the net wins.

Now, onto my predictions for the New Year banzuke…

Yokozuna, Ōzeki and San’yaku

Well this part is easy. Hōshōryū and Ōnosato swap spots because Hōshōryū had a better record in Kyushu. Kotozakura remains in the top ōzeki spot and the newly promoted Aonishiki takes the open spot (ōzeki 1 west).

At sekiwake I have Takayasu and Kirishima. Takayasu moves up to that rank for going 8-7 as a komusubi. Kirishima goes all the way up from maegashira 2 for having the best record, by far, in the jōi. Ōhō is demoted to komusubi for his losing record and Wakamotoharu moves up by virtue of being one of the few other members of the jōi to post a winning record.

The jōi

In my projected jōi, I have Yoshinofuji being given the top spot. This is a bit of a generous promotion, but I think he deserves it based on the faltering of those above him and the fact he beat a yokozuna in the last tournament. The other top spot goes to Ura, with him moving up two spots off just one net win. That’s also a tad generous. But that space needed to be filled after Wakamotoharu and Kirishima went up and everyone else did poorly.

The only survivors here from the last tournament’s jōi are Wakatakakage, Hakuōhō and Tamawashi. I slid Wakatakakage down one spot and Hakuōhō down three spots. I kept Tamawashi where he was at because there wasn’t anyone else close enough below him who deserved to rise above him, in my opinion.

I have given big promotions to Ichiyamamoto and Daieishō. This is, again, since there was a glut of guys with losing records in the jōi and just below the jōi. With so many of them moving down spaces there was a lot of room to advance these two. Ichiyamamoto had the second best record of the tournament, so I think it’s fair he rises this high. Daieishō gets credit for past performances from me. The only reason he has been ranked so lowly lately was because of an injury. He’s a san’yaku guy talent-wise, so I’m happy to push him in that direction.

Atamifuji moves up a space and a half to fill out this section.

Promotions and Relegations