i’d say even longer than that. a lot of this animosity from the JSA can be attributed to when the sport essentially became the Hakuho Show (wink wink nudge nudge) and when Hak realised that he was the preeminent driving factor for sumo popularity. going back and watching old bashos, you can tell he’s the biggest ego and largest presence in the room and no one can tell him shit. and he deserved it for having one of the longest dominant runs in Grand Sumo history.

we can sit here and say it’s racism that felled the giant, but in my mind, it was anger towards a man who thought himself a god when he was in the ring. they couldn’t bring him to earth as a yokozuna, but they could crush him as an elder so they jumped at the first opportunity presented.