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Meltdown: March Sumo tournament reportedly canceled
By Zach Arnold | February 5, 2011
Previous articles:
- February 1, 2011 – The mess in the Japanese fight game grows: More Sumo match-fixing claims by police
- February 3, 2011 – Fuji TV pulls the plug on airing upcoming Sumo tournament
When we last checked in on what was happening on the ground in Japan over alleged admissions by at least three Sumo wrestlers of leaving behind evidence in the form of text messages on their cell phones about throwing bouts, both Fuji TV & NHK had canceled plans of airing Sumo for this month and for March. The Fuji TV cancellation of the March broadcast put the Sumo Association in a horrible situation. Last year, NHK pulled the plug on airing a Nagoya Sumo tournament after a yakuza scandal.
What makes the Sumo scandal story here eerie is that it has a very bad smell, similar to what happened when PRIDE collapsed. Once the TV networks back out, suddenly the power brokers don’t want to be associated with a tainted product. However, PRIDE was a company. Sumo is a sport that has long been protected by politicians and the Japanese government. It’s an institution and anyone who takes on the institution is risking a lot by doing so. The late Toshiro Igari, an activist lawyer that was well-respected in the legal community, went after corruption in baseball and had invested matters related to PRIDE. However, he was making waves in some sensitive places that most consider too hot to handle. More on that in a minute.
Asahi Shimbun has a cover story today called: For struggling wrestlers, the fix was in. The amount of details in the article is worth the read alone. It sets the table of a pending announcement on Sunday where it is reportedly expected that the Sumo Association will cancel their March tournament. Without television support, it makes running the tournaments financially shaky. It would be the first cancellation of a tournament since 1946.
Despite no criminal charges currently being filed, the police and leaks in the media have effectively damaged the sport. And when an arrest is made, there are leaks of admissions about gambling not only on baseball games but Sumo fights as well.
All of this withstanding, this Yomiuri Shimbun report brings up of the hammer being dropped on the Sumo Association. The Yomiuri article is very detailed and requires full reading, but the gist of it is that the Sumo Association has long received favored status as a public corporation. Should the Government decide to dissolve that non-profit status, a lot of assets would be at risk of transfer including the grounds of Ryogoku Kokugikan. Ryogoku is the famous arena that has hosted so many major fighting events involving boxing, pro-wrestling, and Mixed Martial Arts. It was the building that replaced the old Kuramae Kokugikan, which hosted a lot of famous fighting events in the mid 1900s.
Right now, the talk of status dissolution is just that — talk. However, Sumo has long relied on it’s heavy backing from politicians to run its business on NHK TV and for its actual business structure. Take that powerful support away and suddenly you’re dealing with a monumental shake-up for the industry.
Topics: Japan, Media, Zach Arnold | 6 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
So with this happening, will we finally see the Yakuza being driven out of sports in Japan, or is that still only a pipe dream?
Highly unlikely. As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, the Yakuza have tentacles in Japanese history, politics and culture long before they went by that name.
Considering also that match-fixing is not exactly illegal in Japan, and that the police have no anti-racketeering laws to combat them, I’m afraid the Yakuza will remain a force, like it or not.
This is one more storm sumo must weather; once things die down, and a few wrestlers are thrown to the wolves, it will come back once again.
Is any combat sport in Japan not completely falling apart right now?
I think boxing’s pretty healthy, with the Kameda brothers being a pretty big draw there these days. I think Donaire is pretty popular there as well.
It may not be white hot, but it’s not falling apart.
As Gaijin said, boxing is still very popular in Japan, and Judo and Kendo are still doing very well. As long as those two stay amateur forever I think they will be fine. Amateur wrestling is still fine, especially women’s wrestling I bet.
When the light comes in – the cockroaches scramble for cover
There is a lot of anger in the Japanese public towards sumo as people believe theyve been defrauded watching epic battles which turned out to be scripted – how long will it take sumo to recover? 1 year? 10 years? a generation?
The same thing happened to MMA in Japan when Pride’s yakuza ownership came out into the light. People turned off cause all those greats fights they saw now had a question mark against them
But dont tell Scott Coker that as he strips down and get into bed with Shinoda and Real Entertainment (the same people that brought down PRIDE and failed with Dream); “you know, umm, Japanese people just accept the involvement of yakuza in sports and daily life,,, you know, yep”