These guys are sensible, with the exception of Onosato, who looks decisively unhealthy. But, to my relief, neither Hakunofuji nor Onokatsu showed up at the Osaka Prefectural Gymnasium this morning. Their injury reports have not been released, but Onokatsu was obviously having trouble standing up yesterday, and Hakunofuji’s old injuries seem to be plaguing him again. I wish them both the best and hope they don’t come back.

My views on kyujo have pretty much totally shifted recently because of the new crop of young rikishi who just won’t go kyujo. I have always been of the opinion that if going kyujo causes a rank drop but saves a promising sumo future, it’s the best decision to go kyujo and take as much time as needed. However, I was also of the opinion that fighting through the pain is sometimes necessary, but my opinion is now: but why? So, good on these two for protecting themselves, and good luck to them both as they recover from their injuries. Shodai and Kotoshoho collected the fusen wins.

MATCH OF THE DAY: I’m going to say it plainly: no one did anything today outside of the joi. The notable exception was Nishikifuji and Fujiseiun’s delightful bout, which was quite a snugglefest, as they say. Fujiseiun basically lost because he got tired faster, which sucks and is also kind of entertaining. Welcome to Makuuchi, kiddo, as I said to his stablemate Fujiryoga yesterday. He looked very capable today, however; not many sekitori stay in the over-one-minute matches for so long. Kudos to them both.

KIMARITE OF THE DAY: No one had any interesting kimarite! So I guess the winner is, as much as my heart hurts to say it, Takayasu’s defeat of Fujinokawa. I have truly never been a Takayasu follower or fully understood the hype, though I don’t dislike him and I definitely respect him, but he admittedly did a very good job against my beloved Fujinokawa this time around. Fujinokawa did his best and almost got a kubihineri, but Takayasu’s head was just not where he thought it was and Takayasu took him out by sukuinage.

PINK MAWASHI DAY TWO: 2/15ths!! Ura does not beat Oshoma as often as he should, but he did today. I think Ura looked at his last two basho and realized that he was a little too Ura last time, and has reverted to a much more straightforward tactic. As much as it grieves me to see him doing oshi-zumo, it’s definitely more effective. Ura was just faster and stronger than Oshoma today and disposed of him quickly. We will always take the oshidashi, Ura. 2-0. Half the wins you got last time.

OVERALL SUMMARY: If you follow my blog at all (and if you don’t, welcome!), you know how closely I follow Yoshinofuji. I have literally watched his bouts from his debut, and he is stellar. Aonishiki is too, of course, but Yoshinofuji really has a habit of beating Yokozuna and Ozeki, and today was no different. It was a brilliant bout, but Yoshinofuji emerged as the victor and crushed Aonishiki in a beautiful yoritaoshi. One of my other favorite rikishi, Churanoumi, had a surprisingly clean victory over Kirishima, who tsuppari’ed himself into a tight situation which Churanoumi used to shove him neatly out. That means both the Ozeki and Yokozuna candidates lost their matches today; hang in there, boys!

But honestly, at least they lost to my boys. And I don’t think anyone is really going to be able to get in the way of Aonishiki, especially with Onosato in such bad condition. I would like a Hoshoryu yusho, please. And Ura is pretty close to a zensho yusho. It’s really only thirteen more matches. That’s barely anything.

Because Hakkaku is a hater, he’s giving Onosato the interesting opponent of Fujinokawa. I could see either of them winning this; Onosato is bigger, stronger, and better, but over and over, we’ve learned never to underestimate Fujinokawa. Hoshoryu will fight Yoshinofuji in what’s sure to be a brilliant musubi-no-ichiban, and Aonishiki will face Wakatakakage. I do quite like those matchups. Ura will fight Tokihayate. It’s so funny to see Yoshinofuji fighting all of these san’yaku guys in the first few days because I usually depend on him for the mid to late game upset when the Ozeki and Yokozuna have no one to fight except each other. I suppose he’s still doing his job of delivering some awesome upsets, though.