Everyone looks at me strangely when I say that, but I absolutely love sumo wrestling, but I never seem to be able to catch it when it’s on TV. Once in a while, I’ll catch it on ESPN 2, but so far, I haven’t been able to find out what kind of a schedule it’s on. I’ve tried the ESPN web site, but the only thing that came up under a search was a news item about Akebono’s retirement.
Any other sumo fans out there, and if so, can you give me a general idea of when to see it?
Wow…someone else on this board who actually knows something about this sport! 
For the record, I’ve avidly followed sumo matches for many years while they were broadcast on KFVE in Hawaii. There was a 1-day delay due to the need for translations, but I didn’t care. This was a sport unlike any other, and I was thrilled to see the actual matches at the highest level of the sport. (Since the Makuuchi matches are the only ones nationally televised, the lower divisions were pretty much off limits.)
I was watching when Konishiki won his second and third championships. Let me tell you, I have never seen so much space in the local newspapers given to a foreign sport in my life. It was that big. And after Akebono made Yokozuna, well, that pretty much cemented sumo’s status on ths sports pages.
Sadly, KFVE stopped all coverage a few years ago (I still have no idea why). If you want to watch, you pretty much have to order NGN…a premium channel, and definitely not worth it if you’re not into Japanese programming in general. ESPN’s coverage, from what I’ve seen, is really terrible; they try to cram an entire tourney into a 30-minute slot, mispronounciations are rampant, and the tournament is invariably a year old or older by the time they even get around to it.
Here are a few links that should help:
http://www.sumoweb.com
Fairly comprehensive coverage of the Makuuchi bouts; a little on Juryo and the lower divisions.
http://www.wnn.or.jp/wnn-t/index_e.html
Match information and occasional news on the two highest divisions (sekitori).
http://www.accesscom.com/~abe/sumo.html
Fairly extensive sumo database. Borrows some information from the previous site.
http://www.szumo.hu/SZUMOE.HTM
Another sumo information resource.
Hope they help.
Casual fan here. It’s great to watch two well-trained sumo slam together like tectonic plates, and there’s a lot of strategy and skill going on there that non-fans seem to miss.
Didn’t Takenohana become yokozuna recently? I seem to remember seeing it in the NY Times, of all places …
And I’ve been out of touch w/ the sumo world, but isn’t one of the _akanohana brothers (Taka, Waka, I forget which) toying with the idea of trying out for the NFL? Kinda like that guy in The Replacements?
Can you get NHK where you are? NHK would have full coverage of each sumo basho.
The following link will get you to the official sumo page. The actual organization in Japan running the events. You could even schedule your next trip to Japan to coinside with the next basho and even get yourself tickets. You can also get the latest ranking and stay up to date during a tournament.
http://www.sumo.or.jp/index_e.html
FYI, the bashos, or tournaments run six times a year, every other month. Each basho runs for fifteen days, but I’m sure you knew that already.
Jack
Cap’n Crude - Well, I’d hardly call December '94 recent. Takanohana actually won his first championship well before that (January 1992). But he was really streaky in those early years and could never string together two good tourneys in a row. He became incredibly dominant in the mid 90’s, particularly '95 and '96, where he won a total of eight championships; maybe that’s why a national newspaper finally took notice. (Of course, it helped that his main rival was Hawaii-born Akebono.)
KKBatousai - Definitely not Wakanohana, who’s not only still in his stable but the slated successor to the stablemaster, Futagoyama. And considering Takanohana’s enormous fame, it’s hard to see him leaving the sport, especially for a foreign league where he’d be a virtaul no-name. I dismiss this as just a rumor.
DKW, yeah, I pretty much passed it off as rumor when I heard it. The only thing that got my attention is that it was a pretty big name, and I’m pretty sure it was one of the brothers… Oh well, would’ve been interesting.
Actually, it is Wakanohana who’s considering trying out for the NFL. Well, technically it’s not Wakanohana, since he’s not allowed to use that name anymore.
After he retired, he was generally considered to be next in line to take over the Futagoyama stable. All that ended when he suddenly announced he was leaving the Sumo Association. I don’t remember the exact reasons he gave, but he seemed pretty burned out and generally fed up with how he’d lived nothing but sumo since birth.
Now that he’s no longer in the Sumo Association, he can’t publically use the name Wakanohana anymore, so he just goes by his original name, Masaru Hanada. He’s been doing some commercials and TV appearances recently, and I think he has a book coming out.
Here’s some more info I just found. Apparently, his personal problems have included more than just a mid-life crisis. Also, his book is already out.
http://www.tokyoclassified.com/biginjapan/370/biginjapaninc.htm
–sublight, major sumo fan.
p.s. Konishiki (or rather, KONISHIKI, as he’s officially billed now) is now a huge (literally and figuratively) TV star in Japan. He’s a regular on several variety shows and does ads for a number of companies (including Daihatsu sub-compact cars).
My last experience with sumo was the Weezer music video for “Hashpipe”.