Hatsu 2025 Power Rankings
A look at how every top-division sumo wrestler has fared coming into the Hatsu basho.
The Hatsu basho begins on Sunday, and if you’re still wondering who to pick for your first Fantasy Basho on Fantasizr lineup, here’s the most recent edition of our Power Rankings.
With the first basho of the year coming up, we are in the dual mode of looking over 2024 and looking ahead to 2025. It is also time to look at the Power Rankings for the first basho of 2025. Conveniently, the Power Rankings look over the last year of tournaments, showing who has been performing the best coming into this basho.
These Power Rankings actually do an amazing job of showing exactly where sumo stands right now. We’ll break all that down after you see the full rankings. First, a reminder on how these are determined.
Take the Fantasy Basho score for each Makuuchi basho across the last year.
Add 10 points for a Yusho and 5 points for a Jun-Yusho.
Multiple any Juryo win totals by 1.5
Take any Makushita win totals as they are.
Multiple the most recent basho by six, the next most recent by five, and so on over the last year. Add those totals up, then add a Bonus which is the same as the current game’s budget number.
NOTES:
You probably didn’t need a formula to tell you that the three Ozeki are the best rikishi in sumo. Between them, they are responsible for three Yusho and four Jun-Yusho in the past year. Two of them went into the final day of the last tournament tied at 13-1, vying for the yusho. The other guy probably had the best year of any rikishi, which was also his first year in Makuuchi. They are all good.
The Power Rankings do see a clear separation. Despite just 9 wins in his Ozeki debut, Onosato claims the top spot. His 2024 was just that good overall, especially as he won the yusho in September and the 9 in November tied his lowest win total as a Maegashira. Sure, he isn’t the one going for a Yokozuna promotion. He still may be the best performing rikishi coming into 2025.
Kotozakura is the one who got the yusho in November and is aiming for the rope. The Power Rankings merely think he is just a little behind Onosato. Kotozakura’s Kyushu 2024 was the best basho of his career. He got a career-high win total while winning his first yusho. If he repeats, he is displaying a brand-new level of sumo. Don’t forget his current level, or that up to November, was pretty good. He averaged over 10 wins in each basho for the year, something only Onosato can only say.
Hoshoryu is slightly behind his fellow Ozeki by the numbers, although he’s still ahead of everyone else. In fact, if he had managed to trip Kotozakura over on Day Fifteen in Kyushu, he would be nearly even. The Yokozuna Deliberation Council has said Hoshoryu could be up for a Yokozuna promotion with the right kind of yusho. There’s no reason to think that is beyond his capabilities at the moment.
Behind Hoshoryu is Wakatakakage, who is making it clear that he may have really been able to threaten an Ozeki run had he not had the terrible knee injury. He keeps collecting double-digit wins, which has brought him back to Sanyaku. That’s the point where you are supposed to stop getting double-digit wins. Also, you should be slowing down as a sumotori after a bad injury and approaching thirty. Wakatakakage doesn’t seem to care about such precedents.
Behind Wakatakakage is a clutch of sometime Sanyaku veterans in Takanosho, Daieisho, Abi, and Wakamotoharu. All of them could be said to have been “not quite at the level of the Ozeki” recently, but they’ve all been good. This also could perfectly describe each of their careers.
Most sumo fans’ subjective rankings would not put 12 wrestlers ahead of Takerufuji, but the Power Rankings don’t know he’s been either extremely good or injured. It just receives the inputs of “20, 19.5, 3, 0, 39, 19.5” and puts him in the middle. There’s no reason not to be positive about Takerufuji’s Hatsu, but how positive to be and how high you want to place his ceiling seem like fair debates. This ranking should serve as a reminder we don’t have enough evidence that Takerufuji can hold up.
Gonoyama and Oho are completely even on this ranking at 333. They are also the two Maegashira #3, which is neat.
No, I don’t really believe Terunofuji is the worst rikishi right now. They do show he has quite a few basho where he didn’t even compete. Word is that he is competing in Hatsu, so maybe focus on the basho where he didn’t sit out. In those, he’s been dominant. Of course, part of why he gets 0 win basho is he has that right as a Yokozuna. So if you ask me who I believe is most likely to earn 0 wins, I’d say Terunofuji. A bad stumble on Day One or just waking up with a sore knee means he can sit out and keep his rank.
If you want to find a lower Maegashira who may emerge from week one in contention, the Power Rankings aren’t going to help. Partly, this is because no one has stormed the Makuuchi castle from Juryo. Kinbozan had 12 wins in Juryo in November—after having a series of poor Makuuchi performances. Hakuoho also did well in November, but he still seems like he’s recovering from the shoulder surgery he received a year ago. A lower Maegashira doesn’t have to end Week One at 7-0 or 6-1. They can all beat up on each other.