Hard to believe we’re finally at the point where just two more entries remain in this series (full rankings to be released in tomorrow’s writeup!). Yesterday, I prefaced Taiho’s profile with a disclaimer that he likely still has a better claim to #2 behind Hakuho than the wrestler we’re meeting today, despite the fact that Chiyonofuji just ekes him out in this iteration of my formula. I also said that I still believe there is an argument to be made for why Chiyonofuji is deserving of this spot, which I will do my best to put forward here. Whether you end up agreeing is something I cannot predict, but one thing I am quite sure of is that no sumo fan could read about the Wolf’s career and not come away impressed. So without further ado…..

2. 58th Yokozuna Chiyonofuji (1975-1991, 2,660 points in 81 basho, 31x Yusho)

The Story

In many ways, Chiyonofuji has the most unconventional story of all of the dai-Yokozuna. Everything from the non-linear, backloaded progression of his career to his distinctively lean, muscular physique to the rapid turnover of sumo in the ’80s contributed to making him truly a one-of-a-kind rikishi, yet you could count on one hand the number of wrestlers who can claim to have a comparable resume.

First point of distinction: Chiyonofuji is the only dai-Yokozuna who fell out of the sekitori ranks entirely after making his Makuuchi debut. Originally breaking through in 1975 at just 20 years old, the lightweight youngster from Hokkaido was still growing into his frame, and injuries quickly forced him back down into Makushita.

His return to Makuuchi would have to wait until 1978, but even then, his initial results did not scream future Yokozuna potential. In fact, it would not be until his 17th top-division basho that he would crack double-digit wins for the first time, but once the dam broke, he never looked back. Adapting his style, putting on additional weight, and building experience through many tough defeats all culminated in a surprise Ozeki promotion after just his first two basho at Sekiwake, punctuated by a dramatic maiden yusho clinched in a thrilling playoff upset of his first great rival, Kitanoumi.

About to turn 26, the clock was ticking if he wanted to etch his name in the record books, and Chiyonofuji was determined to not waste any more time climbing to the top. It took him only 3 basho at Ozeki to earn his Yokozuna promotion, sealed with another 14-1 effort for his 2nd Emperor’s Cup (again felling Kitanoumi on the final day). Though he was forced to withdraw from his first basho as a Yokozuna, he came back from that injury even stronger, taking 4 of the next 5 tournaments and clearing 12 wins each time out.

However, although Kitanoumi was rapidly fading, Chiyonofuji’s new claim to the throne did not go unopposed. Takanosato, another late bloomer, earned his own Yokozuna promotion in 1983 and emerged victorious in 3 out of 4 consecutive basho where he and Chiyonofuji met on senshuraku to decide the Cup between them. Elsewhere, a formidable Ozeki corps (particularly Wakashimazu and Kotokaze) also managed to snag a few yusho during this stretch.

So, with Chiyonofuji nearing his 30s and the rest of the banzuke looking competitive, it looked like he would maybe be able to snag a few more yusho (he had 10 heading into 1985) before following the normal timeline for a wrestler and retiring a few years later. Of course, the Wolf was no ordinary rikishi.

In 1985, he became just the 3rd man (and easily the oldest) to achieve 80 wins in a season, racking up 4 more yusho along the way. The following year, he was even better, winning all 5 basho he finished and only falling short of his win total from the previous year because of a kyujo. But by the time 1987 rolled around, it finally looked like the decline was beginning for real this time; he “only” won 3 yusho that year and watched as two new Yokozuna (his stablemate Hokutoumi as well as Onokuni) earned their white ropes and announced their intent to end his dominance.

Incredibly, Chiyonofuji came back even stronger in 1988, winning the last 4 tournaments of the year and breaking Taiho’s record for the longest win streak in the Modern Era (53 bouts), falling just one match short of becoming the first man in history to record 3 consecutive 15-0 performances. That he went on such a run is impressive enough; to do it at 33 defies all reason. And he still wasn’t done.

He won a 27th yusho in early 1989, but suffered a personal tragedy in the summer, when his youngest daughter passed before the Nagoya basho. Bravely mounting the dohyo anyway, he battled his way to a 12-2 record, but lost a chance to seal the yusho on senshuraku. Forced into a playoff against Hokutoumi (the first in history to be contested by two Yokozuna from the same heya), Chiyonofuji executed one of his trademarked throws to seal what had to have been one of his most emotional triumphs.

In 1990, he remained competitive, despite the fact that he would turn 35 that year and that yet another new Yokozuna had joined the party. After twice being denied a 31st yusho by Asahifuji as the latter put together an impressive promotion bid over the summer, Chiyonofuji returned in November determined to prove he still had what it took to lift the Emperor’s Cup. As luck would have it, he got his chance to clinch the title on Day 14 against the new Yokozuna, and though he had to dig deep, he somehow outmuscled Asahifuji and forced him out, a fitting final display of physical might for a rikishi for whom fitness, strength, and longevity were calling cards.

In the next tournament, he managed to surpass Kitanoumi’s record for most career top-division victories, but had to withdraw shortly thereafter and would never complete another basho, eventually retiring in May of 1991. After so many comebacks and one late-career renaissance after another, it must have seemed surreal to see him exit the dohyo for good; one of the few eternal truths in sport is that you can’t outrun Father Time forever, but Chiyonofuji had sure made him work far harder than most.

The Stats

Because of how unique his career was, you won’t be surprised to learn that it can be difficult to effectively compare Chiyonofuji to the other dai-Yokozuna quantitatively. Looking at just the raw counting stats, he’s in the same tier as Taiho (with only 1 fewer yusho, jun-yusho, and zensho) and is comfortably clear of the trio of Kitanoumi/Takanohana/Asashoryu, none of whom have more than 25 Emperor’s Cups.

At the same time, he also needed a full additional two years on the banzuke than Taiho to amass the same totals, and his rate stats/averages are accordingly much closer to Kitanoumi and Takanohana than they are to Taiho, Hakuho, or even Asashoryu (with the caveat that Asashoryu fought in 26 fewer basho).

As I discussed a couple of days ago, Chiyonofuji’s career numbers parallel Kitanoumi to a closer degree than any other dai-Yokozuna (even if they took very different routes to get there), with the main point of distinction between them being that Chiyonofuji possessed arguably the greatest clutch gene in sumo history.

There are many ways to determine a rikishi’s clutch factor (perhaps the subject of a future series?), but no matter how you slice it, there’s a decent chance Chiyonofuji will be near the top of the list. I first mentioned this in Kitanoumi’s writeup, but the Wolf boasts an absurd 6-0 record in yusho playoffs (7-0 if you include lower divisions), the only man in the Modern Era to fight in more than 3 playoffs and emerge victorious every single time.

Even Taiho and Hakuho, each renowned for their execution under pressure, lag behind Chiyonofuji in this metric, sporting 5-2 and 6-4 records in playoff matches, respectively. And these were not easy matchups, either; all 6 of Chiyonofuji’s playoffs came against current or future Yokozeki, and over half of them required him to beat an opponent who had defeated him once already in the same basho.

Another measure by which you can attempt to determine how clutch a rikishi was is looking at their total career yusho + jun-yusho (a decent approximation for the # of tournaments in which a wrestler had a shot at the Cup) and seeing how many of those “yusho opportunities” they converted into victories. Of the 58 Modern Era rikishi with at least 5 such opportunities, only Asashoryu has a higher conversion rate than Chiyonofuji, though the latter’s 74% across 42 chances is arguably more impressive than the Mongolian’s 76% across 33.

Again, this is an imperfect metric (e.g., some jun-yusho are only 10/11-win performances that weren’t truly yusho-worthy, while 12/13-win basho don’t always earn a JY), but in conjunction with his playoff record, it’s clear that Chiyonofuji was markedly better than even other dai-Yokozuna in terms of seizing his opportunities and separating himself from the pack in the second week.

This opportunistic streak captures a lot about Chiyonofuji’s style of sumo and the nature of his career. Never the tallest nor heaviest, he was often at a disadvantage relative to his Yokozeki contemporaries, but made up for this with cunning technique, an incredible competitive drive, and maximizing of his physical tools to cultivate an aura of invincibility that few rikishi in history can claim to rival. And this meant that, even though his kyujo-adjusted win rate (11.4 wins per basho) puts him only barely ahead of Takanohana for second-to-last among the dai-Yokozuna, his Yrate of 38% is nearly 10% clear of Takanohana, and he’s the only other man in history besides Hakuho with 70+ career basho and a Yrate that’s higher than 31%.

Two other quick observations are worth mentioning here. First, Chiyonofuji’s career numbers are heavily dragged down by his pre-Yokozuna career to a greater degree than any of the other greats. The fact that it took him until his mid-20s to break through as a yusho contender puts him behind the 8 ball when compared to the typical “generational talent” archetype that most (if not all) of the other dai-Yokozuna fall into.

However, if you look at just their accomplishments after earning their tsuna, it’s a different story: Chiyonofuji has as many yusho as Taiho (and 1 more JY) in only one more basho as a Yokozuna, has a higher KKrate than either Hakuho or Taiho, and has a practically equivalent win average (10.6 per basho to Hakuho/Taiho’s 10.7), Yrate (49% to H/T’s 50%), and match win % (85% to H/T’s 87/86%).

Of course, this is not to say that his pre-promotion stats should be ignored (and being an immediate contender is certainly relevant to greatness), but it does hopefully emphasize the fact that Chiyonofuji was essentially just as dominant over the course of his Yokozuna reign as Taiho and Hakuho in terms of these metrics, and when you factor in his age, he arguably had the second-most impressive Yokozuna tenure ever.

Which brings me to my final point: in terms of evaluating the competitiveness of his era, Chiyonofuji’s reign is again arguably the most difficult to compare with his dai-Yokozuna peers.

On the one hand, he is unique in the fact that he is the only one to have spent 5+ basho at the rank alongside 7 different Yokozuna; compare this to Taiho (5 Yokozuna), Kitanoumi (5), Hakuho (4), Takanohana (3), and Asashoryu (2). His reign also overlapped for 4+ years each with 3 of the 7 longest Ozeki stints ever (Hokutenyu, Asashio IV, and Konishiki), a feat matched only by Asashoryu among the other dai-Yokozuna.

At the same time, not all co-Yokozeki are created equal, and for my money, I think Chiyonofuji ultimately benefited from his era more than he suffered (particularly at the tail end of the ‘80s and early ‘90, where a number of potential heirs to the throne fell short of their potential).

For example, 4 of those 7 Yokozuna referenced above rank among the bottom 7 Modern Era Yokozuna under our formula, including the only Yokozuna without a yusho to his name (Futahaguro). And, while Chiyonofuji did have multiple high-profile rivalries, none were thorns in his side for very long: Kitanoumi retired only a few years into the Wolf’s reign, Takanosato retired only 2.5 years after his promotion despite having the edge briefly over Chiyonofuji, and 8x yusho-winner Hokutoumi, in addition to having a shortened prime, only fought Chiyonofuji once in their careers due to hailing from the same stable.

The Summary

If there is one through line to today’s write-up, it is that Chiyonofuji does not fit neatly into any of the typical boxes in which we often sort rikishi, not least the other legends with whom he shares the top of these rankings. And yet, it is likely that the unconventional nature of his sumo, his physique, and his career is precisely what has made him such a compelling figure in the annals of the sport’s history.

In many ways, his story is inherently relatable, an undersized late bloomer in a sport dominated by giants, written off by many before he had even had a chance to make his mark on the dohyo. In other ways, he was utterly beyond what anyone could imagine, with his rippling muscles, ruthless execution under the highest stakes, and seemingly indefatigable fighting spirit long after other rikishi would have called it quits bringing something to sumo that no wrestler ever had before. I believe it was this tension between his underdog narrative and transcendent greatness that contributed to his status as potentially the most popular sumo wrestler of all time, a status he enjoyed all through his retirement until his untimely death from pancreatic cancer in 2016.

Ultimately, few rikishi in history can claim to be his equal in terms of the dominance he imposed at his peak or in his longevity at the sport’s highest rank, and likely only Hakuho can definitively claim to have surpassed him in his unprecedented combination of both. Moreover, Chiyonofuji’s steady presence during one of sumo’s most chaotic and unpredictable eras means that his own story is interwoven among that of so many other legendary rikishi, and it is his career that is the bridge from the early Modern Era (defined by Taiho and Kitanoumi) to the popularity boon and international expansion that would follow in the ’90s and beyond.

With all that being said, no matter where one thinks he deserves to fall all-time, you get the sense that such a ranking would be insufficient to really convey the full breadth of his legacy. Something tells me that would have been just fine with the Wolf.

As always, thanks for reading; this was among the most challenging write-ups of this entire series, but I hope I managed to do some measure of justice to one of sumo’s most unique legends! I’ll see you all back here tomorrow, at the only place this series could ever have ended…

-Chiyomomo