Report Card: 2025 Nagoya Basho - Part 2

Continuing to grade the top division rikishi who were involved in the May tournament.

I’m back with another report card as I work to put the 2025 Nagoya basho to bed before I gear up to cover the 2025 aki basho. I’m not sure how that coverage is going to look like. I might need to be cut back a little bit, compared to how I usually do things.

Here’s the deal… When Bloody Elbow started crumbling, I knew I needed to switch up my career. I decided to go back to school and study to become a social service worker. I’ve been doing this part-time for a couple of years now, but this September is when things kick into high gear. That’s when I’ll be going on my first field placement. That field placement basically means unpaid job three days out of the week. Then I have to find time to do my regular paying job (writing for MMA Mania). Add parenting and partnering to that and I’m already stretched pretty thin. Then there’s Sumo Stomp!, my labour of love.

I’m not sure if I’ll be able to do a daily tournament update that month. If I am, then it will have to be a lot more brief than my usual posts and possibly go out in the evenings instead of the mornings. I may also have to cut back on other posts I do around that tournament, like report cards. We’ll see, though.

In the meantime, here’s my second report card from the last tournament. This time around I’m grading Shōdai, Churanoumi, Asakōryū, Midorifuji, Tokihayate, Takanoshō, Rōga, Atamifuji, Chiyoshōma and Ura.

This is a premium post. It cuts off in the Takanoshō section. If you’d like to read all of this (and gain access to the archive and get a discount on merch), you’ll need a paid membership.

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Also, I was on the Level Change yesterday to wrap up the Nagoya basho with my good friend Stephie Haynes. My mind felt a little slippery during this one and I started to lose my voice mid-show. When that happened I remembered that mini Sumo Stomp! had sneezed right in my face recently. It’s always cold and flu season when you have kids!

Nagoya Basho Review with Tim Bissell | Ep. 375

Bonus gif is this Shōdai fan! Love the Shōdai pose on this towel, by the way.

Shōdai

Rank: Maegashira 13 West
Record: 9-6
Grade: B

Shōdai did what was expected of him in Nagoya, banking a pretty solid kachi-koshi (winning record) from a low ranking. At only 33, Shōdai should still be a problem for the rank-and-filers who live down near the bottom of the division and aren’t quite good enough to progress much further. Prior to this Nagoya tournament, Shōdai had gotten all 6-9 records this year, slipping from M4 down to M13. I’m relieved to see he could stop the rot here. After all, it was only a year ago that he went 10-5 from M4 and secured a promotion to komusubi.

Shōdai’s sumō is a constant battle between being sturdy and sleepy. In Nagoya, the sturdy side mostly won out. He was even nimble at times, too, like when he skipped away from a diving Churanoumi or tossed Rōga over his hip.

There were a few sleepy moments, though, like when Kotoeiho and Mitakeumi closed on him quickly and made him quit on the boundary.

Churanoumi

Rank: Maegashira 13 East
Record: 9-6
Grade: B

Churanoumi has been very inconsistent this year. This decent 9-6 comes after a paltry 4-11 in May. He beat everyone he was supposed to beat and half his losses were to wrestlers who were having fantastic tournaments (Kotoshōhō, Kusano, Atamifuji).

Churanoumi did a good job of implementing his sumō in Nagoya. That looks like him going for a left hand mae-mitsu (front grip) and then ripping pushes and thrusts if he can’t get it. He’s best when he mixes up yotsu (belt grabbing) and oshi (pushing/thrusting) techniques. Whenever he got stuck doing just one he usually ran into problems, like when he went all yotsu against Atamifuji above or when he got stuck just thrusting against Tokihayate before being pushed over the edge.

Asakōryū

Rank: Maegashira 12 West
Record: 6-9
Grade: D+

This was a tough tournament for Asakōryū, who was competing at his highest ever rank. His tournament was largely ruined due to a seven bout losing streak between days four and ten. We’re in rare times right now in that there are a decent number of smaller wrestlers all competing in makuuchi. Because of this, it’s very important for those small guys win those match-ups against each other. Asakōryū failed to do that in July. He lost against Midorifuji, Fujinokawa and Kayo. The only small guy he beat was Tokihayate, who he got down with a lovely shitatenage (underarm throw). Asakōryū is the strongest of the small wrestlers, but even so, it’s tough for him to piece together eight wins if he can’t score more than one or two off people his own size. Four of Asakōryū’s six wins came by throws. He has fantastic technique on those, but he can struggle to score them against bigger yotsu guys (see how Rōga was able to block his throw and respond with his own below).

Midorifuji

Rank: Maegashira 12 East
Record: 9-6
Grade: B+

Midorifuji was the opposite of Asakōryū in Nagoya. He beat most his small opponents (Asakōryū, Kayo, Tokihayate) and then needed to find just five wins against bigger opponents to get his winning record. Midorifuji is very comfortable at this rank, so I was expecting him to do well here. He really only struggles once he gets ranked higher than M10.

Midorifuji’s sumō was very composed and relaxed in Nagoya. He looked like he was trying to utilize his speed and mobility more than he usually does, though. He was also stepping off centre more in the tachiai, giving himself more room and an angle to bring down big opponents like Takanoshō. He stepped off centre against Tokihayate, too. See that below. He wasn’t able to immediately benefit from that, but he showed a lot of toughness and technique to stay in bounds and then get Tokihayate down.

Midorifuji didn’t land his trademark katasukashi (under shoulder swing down) in July. He did get a rare kainahineri (two handed twist down) on Rōga, though.

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Tokihayate

Rank: Maegashira 11 West
Record: 6-9
Grade: D

The highest ranked of our smaller guys, Tokihayate, lost to Asakōryū, Midorifuji and Fujinokawa in Nagoya. That made his path to eight wins especially difficult, considering he was also being matched with slightly higher ranked opponents. Overall, Tokihayate’s sumō looked a little clunky in Nagoya. When he’s performing well, he’s a very smooth rikishi. He’s great at getting under opponents and sweeping them to the side to set up his pulling throws. This time around, though, he was stuttering along the clay more than he was gliding.

Three of his six wins in this tournament were against higher ranked opponents, which is not bad. The problem was that all but one of his losses came against opponents he was ranked higher than, including Shishi (M17), Mitakeumi (M16) and Hidenoumi (M15).

I’ve been quite high on Tokihayate. I really appreciate his style and I think it’s very fun to watch him pull guys off balance and then, artfully, roll them over onto their backs. He’ll get a minor demotion due to this result. That will put him down tomorrow around M13, which has been his sweet-spot in the past.

Takanoshō

Rank: Maegashira 11 East
Record: 9-6
Grade: B+

Takanoshō started the year at maegashira 1. He struggled there, as has always been the case whenever Takanoshō gets ranked that high. He’s very comfortable at M11, though. At this rank, in Nagoya, he was able to throw his weight around and overwhelm some of the less experience makuuchi wrestlers. One of his best performances came against Kusano (below).