Ranking Movement Tracking

[John Szczepanski <johnski@iol.ie>]

Further to David Aragon's query on movement through the ranks, I'll be
interested to know more details as well.  I would assume that the movement
up or down for any one individual is related to the movement and initial
ranks of all the other rikishi, and therefore becomes something like a large
linear programming model where you have constraints at both the top and
bottom ends and have to work towards the middle.  Between the November and
January tournaments, rikishi with 8-7 records rose between 0 and 4 places;
Tosanoumi at M1 moved 0, basically because he couldn't, whereas M6 Kenkoh
and M7 Kyokushuzan moved 4 places because 8 of the 12 rikishi between
Komusubi and M5 had losing records, creating a vacuum at the top.

This is an especially interesting topic for me as I've been wondering
whether M3W Kyokushuzan's 9-6 record will be enough to launch him into
Komusubi rank in March.  Does anyone have a feel for this?  This will be
determined largely by how far Kaio and Kotonishiki fall, but if past basho
offer any clue it would seem he's in there.  As an M5 in the May '95 bashso,
Kotonowaka was promoted to Komusubi after a 9-6 record, and back in January
of '87, the giant-killer Masurao (now of the Oonomatsu stable) moved up to
Komusbi in the next basho from M4 with only an 8-7 record.  A look at those
tournaments showed the obvious:  all the top rikishi lost big-time.

I'm looking forward to hearing more about this.  I was a little surprised
when M2 Akinoshima was promoted to Komusubi after going 9-6 in November '96
while M1 Tosanoumi stayed put despite going 8-7.  It may be a case that 9-6
MUST guarantee movement greater than ONE rank (openings permitting), whereas
8-7 carries no guarantee of promotion.  From my personal point of view, I'd
see the month-to-month rankings as one way in which the Association could
equalize some of the impact of the Futagoyama-beya advantage.  A look at
their matches would show that in November Tosa' had a tougher time of it to
get his 8-7 than Aki' did getting to 9-6.  Perhaps in tight races like this
someone could throw the higher rank to the non-Futagoyama rikishi.  Yeah, I
know, I'm just a dreamer...

I really love this newsgroup!