Highlights
Ippatsu
April 25, Game 1, E1-0
In E1-0, Rumi starts the game in the south seat and is trying to get the team back into 1st place in the standings.
Rumi starts out the hand 2-shanten with a ryanmen and two connected red fives. In the first row, Rumi draws a 6m to complete a 456m sequence to go along with her 456s sequence. With a 2346p shape in hand, she has a chance at sanshoku with a 5p draw and a guaranteed sanshoku on a 1p or 4p draw. On turn 6, Rumi draws the 5p and calls riichi on a 147p wait. If she can get either the 1p or 4p, she would win with sanshoku and a haneman. Immediately after, Takamiya, who is iishanten with two dora, throws the 1p and deals into Rumi. Rumi wins the hand with Riichi/Ippatsu/Pinfu/Sanshoku/Aka 2 for 12,000.
Hope For Ura
April 25, Game 1, S4-0
Video: https://abema.tv/video/episode/444-15_s90_p1066
In S4-0, Honda is in 3rd place, 14,800 behind 2nd place dealer Shiratori and 22,100 behind 1st place Rumi. Though top spot is a bit far, Honda can move up a placement with a mangan direct hit, a haneman tsumo or a general baiman ron.
Honda starts out the hand 2-shanten with a red 5p and 69 ryanmens in all three suits. On turn 2, he draws the 6s to shift the hand towards a 678 sanshoku. On turn 3, he draws the 6p to complete that sequence. He technically has a choice to take a 7m or 8m tanki, but he rejects the tenpai to aim for sanshoku and breaks up his 123m sequence. On his next draw, he gets a 4m for a tenpai chance at tanyao. Since sanshoku isn’t guaranteed with the 69m ryanmen, he shifts his plan to a simple Riichi/Tsumo/Pinfu/Tanyao/Aka 1/Ura 1 chance. For now, he takes an 8m tanki, hoping to draw something else for pinfu.
At the end of the first row, Honda draws a red 5s. Though it isn’t pinfu, it does fill in one han. Since Honda can move into 2nd with a Riichi/Tsumo/Tanyao/Aka 2/Ura 1, Honda takes the gamble and calls riichi on a 58s nobetan.
All he needs is one uradora or a direct hit off Shiratori. With Honda being Shiratori’s biggest opponent, Shiratori chooses to fold and be satisfied with his placement. With Shiratori folding, Honda’s only hope not is to draw it himself. As the wall got shorter and shorter, it seemed like the game was over. Then, on Honda’s second-last draw, Honda draws the 8s and wins the hand. Unfortunately, the uradora misses and Honda is left with just a mangan. Honda wins with Riichi/Tsumo/Tanyao/Aka 2 for 2,000/4,000, a strong gamble that didn’t pan out this time.
Furiten Riichi
April 25, Game 2, E3-0
Video: https://abema.tv/video/episode/444-14_s70_p749
In E3-0, Setokuma is in 4th place and 8,600 behind 1st place. With a mangan tsumo, he can move into top spot.
Setokuma starts out the hand. 2-shanten with a pair of red dragons and a connected 2m dora. In the first run, he breaks his penchan for a 3s kanchan and creates a 6m kanchan for iishanten. On turn 6, he draws a 6m to get him tenpai on a yakuless 3s kanchan. On his very next draw, he draws the 3s. But, he doesn’t call tsumo! Instead, Setokuma chooses to make a bold move and calls a furiten riichi on a 147m wait, hoping to get the 1m for ittsuu.
On his very next draw, on the ippatsu turn, Setokuma gets his 7m back and calls tsumo! Setokuma wins the hand with Riichi/Ippatsu/Tsumo/Dora 1 for 2,000/4,000, four times more than if he called tsumo a turn earlier.
Lots of Bonuses
April 25, Game 2, S1-2
Video: https://abema.tv/video/episode/444-14_s40_p748
In S1-2, Takizawa is the dealer in 1st place and 1,600 ahead of his next opponent. With 3,600 in bonuses available to the next winner, this is best time to extend that lead.
Takizawa starts out the hand 3-shanten for chiitoi (4-shanten for a standard hand) with a pair of 5s dora. In the first row, Takizawa draws a red 5s to create an ankou and gets to 2-shanten. While Takizawa waits, Setokuma calls to advance himself to tenpai. After calling pon on the green dragon and red dragon, Setokuma gets to tenpai on a white dragon tanki. With the white dragon twice-cut, Setokuma switches his wait to a 58m ryanmen a few turns later.
Soon after Setokuma switches his wait, Takizawa fills in a ryanmen to get to iishanten. With one more draw, Takizawa gets to tenpai and calls riichi on a 36m ryanmen. Just two turns after that, Takizawa draws the 3m and wins the hand. Takizawa wins with Riichi/Tsumo/Dora 3/Aka 1 for 6,000+200 all plus three riichi sticks to put him over 50,000.
A Tanyao to End It All
April 27, Game 1, S4-2
Video: https://abema.tv/video/episode/444-14_s50_p743
Most of the game has been fairly quiet thus far. The biggest hand so far has been a 3-han hand. As we enter S4-2, the scores are very close with 1st and 4th place separated by 6,300. In the middle of it all is Shiratori, 3rd place and 4,800 behind 1st place Yu. With 1,600 in bonus sticks available, Shiratori can get any 3-han hand to win the game.
Shiratori starts out the hand 3-shanten with two ryanmens, a red 5p and a dora 8s. In the first row, Shiratori actually completes a sequence completely separate from his ryanmens and gets to iishanten at the end of the first row. However, though Shiratori’s hand looks nice, Hori the dealer is already tenpai and has already called riichi on a 25m ryanmen.
With Shiratori being iishanten and holding enough value for a comeback, Shiratori pushes. After multiple turns of drawing and discarding dangerous tiles, Shiratori finally fills a 7s kanchan and waits dama on a 3s tanki. with each draw, no matter how dangerous, Shiratori would draw and discard, holding onto the 3s tanki. Then, near the end of the hand, Hori draws and discards the 3s and deals into Shiratori. Shiratori wins the hand with Tanyao/Dora 1/Aka 1 for 5,200+600 plus two riichi sticks to win the game.
K Start
April 27, Game 2, E1-1
In E1-1, Nakabayashi is the dealer and holding a slight lead after being tenpai the previous hand. The team is in 5th place and needs quite a few points to challenge the top 4.
Nakabayashi starts out the hand 3-shanten with not much in terms of good shapes or value. The first row focused mostly on improving his shapes, giving him some ryanmen options and being 2-shanten at the end of the first row. The second row focused on filling some of those shapes, getting to iishanten with a chance at pinfu and tanyao with a 2m draw. On Nakabayashi’s very next draw, he gets the 2m and calls riichi on a 47s ryanmen. Two turns after that, Nakabayashi draws the 4s and wins the hand. Nakabayashi wins the hand with Riichi/Tsumo/Pinfu/Tanyao/Ura 1 for 4,000+100 all plus a riichi stick to widen his lead.
Uchikawa’s Nightmare
April 27, Game 2, E1-2
Video: https://abema.tv/video/episode/444-14_s80_p747
In E1-2, Nakabayashi is in 1st place and Uchikawa is 18,400 behind him. Both teams are currently out of a finals spot, both players need to win.
At the start, we see Nakabayashi the dealer 3-shanten with tanyao and Uchikawa 3-shanten with a red 5p and a lone north dora. Between the two of them, Uchikawa is the one who manages to advance faster. After filling in a kanchan and a ryanmen and creating another ryanmen, Uchikawa gets to tenpai on turn 5 and calls riichi on a 25s ryanmen.
By this point, Nakabayashi is still 2-shanten. Even so, each of Nakabayashi’s discards are either useful or fairly safe. In the middle of the second row, Nakabayashi gets to tenpai and calls riichi on a 58p ryanmen. If Nakabayashi gets the 8p, he would win sanshoku as well. After many turns of exchanging draws and discards, Uchikawa unfortunately draws the 8p in the middle of the third row and deals the takame into Nakabayashi. Nakabayashi wins the hand with Riichi/Pinfu/Tanyao/Sanshoku for 12,000+600 plus Uchikawa’s riichi stick to bring Nakabayashi above 50,000.
Big Bonus
April 27, Game 2, E2-3
In E2-3, Matsumoto is the dealer in 3rd place, 1,100 behind 2nd place Hisato and 24,700 behind 1st place Nakabayashi. After the previous two hands went to a draw, there is now 3,900 in bonuses available to the next winner.
Matsumoto starts out the hand with a messy 4-shanten hand with a penchan, two kanchans and a few terminals and honours. With so much static, it seems like the only way this hand would win is with riichi.
Along with the bad shapes, Matsumoto has to contend with Hisato who is tenpai after two calls on a 6s/7p shanpon.
By the end of the first row, Matsumoto is still 3-shanten with a pair of 1p and an 8m kanchan stopping him from easily calling tanyao. Soon after, Nakabayashi gets to tenpai, though on a yakuless 5m kanchan.
Through the middle of the second row, Matsumoto’s only hope was still riichi, getting to iishanten and still holding onto the 1p pair. At the end of the row, Matsumoto replaced the 1p pair with a 6p pair, slowly shifting to a tanyao hand. In the third row, he manages to pair the 7m dora to get rid of the 8m kanchan and shift the 6p pair to a 345566p shape. After such a bad starting hand, Matsumoto was somehow iishanten for tanyao. With a pon on the 6p, Matsumoto gets to tenpai on a 14m ryanmen (with the 4m being the only tile to give a yaku). On his very next draw, he gets the 4m and wins the hand. Matsumoto wins with Tanyao/Dora 2/Aka 1 for 4,000+300 all plus three riichi sticks.
Uchikawa’s Nightmare Continues
April 27, Game 2
In E2-5, Uchikawa is in last place and at -1,000 even before the east round is halfway through.
At the start, Uchikawa is 3-shanten with tanyao and Nakabayashi is 2-shanten with a dora 4m. Very quickly, Nakabayashi draws exactly what he needs and calls riichi on turn 3 on a 69s ryanmen. During the ippatsu turn, Uchikawa throws the 6s trying to accept an 11-tile mangan iishanten and deals into Nakabayashi. Nakabayashi wins the hand with Riichi/Ippatsu/Pinfu/Dora 1 for 8,000+1,500, pushing Uchikawa below -10,000.
Video: https://abema.tv/video/episode/444-14_s40_p749
In E3-0, Uchikawa is now the dealer and has a chance to recover some points. He starts out the hand 3-shanten with a pair of white dragons and a connected dora 5s. In the first row, Uchikawa is only able to get to 2-shanten, but he does have most of his shapes secured. In the second row, Uchikawa makes the white dragon an ankou and fills in a ryanmen to get to tenpai and calls riichi on a 4s kanchan.
Though things look good for Uchikawa, there is trouble brewing to his right. In Hisato’s hand is 11 souzu, including two of the 5s dora (one of which is also red). Hisato starts off by throwing the safe 8m to transition his hand to a chinitsu. At the end of the second row, Hisato draws a 4s to get to iishanten. As Uchikawa draws and discards the 3s, Hisato calls chii and gets to tenpai on a 36s ryanmen. On Uchikawa’s last draw, the second-last tile in the wall, he draws and discards the 3s and deals into Hisato. Hisato wins the hand with Chinitsu/Dora 2/Aka 1 for 16,000 plus Uchikawa’s riichi stick, moving Uchikawa down to -27,500.
Ishibashi Trap
April 27, Game 2, E4-0
Video: https://abema.tv/video/episode/444-14_s40_p750
In E4-0, Hisato is now the dealer sitting 6,100 behind 2nd place Matsumoto and 16,100 behind 1st place Nakabayashi.
Hisato starts out the hand 3-shanten with two ryanmens and a 357s shape (with the 5s being the red five). If Hisato manages to draw the 4s and 5p, he also has a chance at sanshoku. On turn 2, he draws a 2p to kill the sanshoku, but gets to iishanten for a manzu ittsu on turn 3, missing only an 8m. At the end of the first row, Hisato draws the 8m and has a choice to take a 3s or a 5s tanki tenpai. Using Ishibashi Nobuhiro’s signature move, Uchikawa calls riichi by throwing the red 5s and waits on a 3s tanki.
A few turns later in the middle of the second row, Nakabayashi, the player that replaced Ishibashi, discards the 3s to take iishanten and deals into Hisato. Hisato wins the hand with Riichi/Ittsuu for 7,700 to come within 700 of 1st place.
Matsumoto the Fighter
April 27, Game 2, S1-2
In S1-2, Matsumoto is in 3rd place, 1,400 behind 2nd place and 15,100 behind 1st place Nakabayashi.
Matsumoto starts out the hand 2-shanten with a pair of souths and two red fives. On turn 4, Matsumoto draws a 4s to secure the red 5s and gets to iishanten. In the second row, Hisato is the first to tenpai as he calls chii on a 789s sequence and discards the south to get to an 8p kanchan tenpai.
With a pon on the south, Matsumoto gets to tenpai on a 3m kanchan. On Hisato’s next draw, he draws and discards the 3m and deals into Matsumoto. Matsumoto wins the hand with Double South/Aka 2 for 8,000+600 plus a riichi stick to put him 5,500 from Nakabayashi.
Please, Won’t Someone Wake Uchikawa?
April 27, Game 2
In S2-0, Uchikawa is deep into 4th place with -30,900 and 61,500 behind 3rd place. Uchikawa just wants to call riichi just once and not deal in.
Uchikawa starts out the hand 3-shanten with not much value in hand. In the first row, Uchikawa confirms ryanmens and creates an ankou of 4m, getting him to 2-shanten. On turn 7, he fills in a ryanmen and then another one on his next turn. Though he has a choice to take a 7m riichi only hand now, he decides to cut his 1s pair to aim for tanyao. On his very next turn, he draws the 7m. Though it would have been ippatsu, Uchikawa is now tenpai for tanyao and calls riichi on a 23m wait.
Though it is a nice wait, Matsumoto the dealer has other plans. On the ippatsu turn, he draws a red 5m to go along with his pair of 9p doras. With mangan possible, Matsumoto discards his 89s block for iishanten. At the start of the third row, Matsumoto gets to tenpai and calls riichi on a 6m kanchan. Just a few turns later, Uchikawa unluckily draws and discards the 6m and deals into Matsumoto. Matsumoto wins the hand with Riichi/Dora 2/Aka 1 for 12,000 plus Uchikawa’s riichi stick to move above 60,000. For Uchikawa, he now sits at -43,900 and is 3,700 away from the lowest score of all time.
In S2-1, Uchikawa starts out with a good starting hand, 2-shanten with a pair of double souths and a 7p away from sanshoku. When Uchikawa discards the red dragon from his hand, Nakabayashi calls pon. Luckily for Uchikawa, the pon shifted the wall so that he would get to iishanten on his next draw. However, as Uchikawa waited for tenpai, Nakabayashi kept building his hand. At the start of the second row, Nakabayashi calls chii on the dora 3s to get to tenpai on a 3m kanchan. On Uchikawa’s draw, he draws the 3m. With the tile isolated, he discards it and deals into Nakabayashi.
Nakabayashi wins the hand with Red Dragon/Dora 2/Aka 1 for 8,000+300 to put him 800 above Matsumoto. For Uchikawa, he now has -52,200, a score so tragically low that they had to pause the game to get enough replacement point sticks to make the payment.
Final Push
April 27, Game 2, S4-0
Video: https://abema.tv/video/episode/444-14_s80_p748
In S4-0, the scores are close between the top two players with 800 separating 1st place Nakabayashi and 2nd place Matsumoto. Whichever of the two wins the next hand will win the game.
At the start, Nakabayashi is 3-shanten with a bunch of kanchans and Matsumoto 3-shanten with two completed sequences and a 788s shape. Comparing the two, Matsumoto seems to have the slight edge. Also in the mix is Hisato, who makes two souzu calls to push for a flush. In the first row, Nakabayashi calls pon on the 8p to shift his hand to tanyao while all Matsumoto can only wait for riichi since he has a 123m and a 789m sequence. Even as Matsumoto is the first to iishanten, he can’t do anything to speed it up. In the second row, Nakabayshi shifts his hand for faster shapes while Matsumoto sits waiting for tenpai. Filling in a 4m kanchan, Nakabayashi gets to iishanten in the middle of the second row. With a pon on the 6p, Nakabayashi gets to tenpai on a 58s ryanmen. At the end of the row, Nakabayashi draws the 5s to win the hand and the game. Nakabayashi wins with Tanyao only for 300/500 take top spot.
The game featured two new M-League records. With Matsumoto’s 59,600, he now has the highest-ever second place. As for Uchikawa, he now has the lowest-ever score in M-League history with -54.500, an unfortunate award caused by being on the losing end of riichi calls and bad timing.
Hagiwara Heights
April 28, Game 1
Video: https://abema.tv/video/episode/444-14_s70_p750
In S1-0, Hagiwara is in 2nd place and 900 behind 1st place Mizuhara.
Hagiwara starts the hand off 4-shanten with a pair of red dragons and a single 6p dora. On turn 2, Hagiwara draws a single green dragon to go with his single white dragon and red dragon pair, giving a distant hope at a shousangen or even daisangen. On turn 3, Hagiwara draws a second green dragon and on turn 5, he draws a third red dragon. With just two more white dragons and a green dragon, he would have yakuman. In the middle of the second row, he draws a third green dragon and has a choice. He can either throw the white dragon to be tenpai on a 5p kanchan, or he can toss the dora to be shousangen and daisangen iishanten. Since he isn’t that desperate for points, he tosses the whiet dragon and waits dama on a 5p kanchan. Unfortunately, on his very next draw, he draws the white dragon.
Though it does sting a bit, he is still tenpai for a decent hand. At the end of the second row, Hagiwara draws a second 6p to upgrade to a 25p wait. Soon after, Aki discards the 2p and deals into Hagiwara. Hagiwara wins the hand with Green Dragon/Red Dragon/Dora 2 for 8,000 to take the lead.
In S2-0, Hagiwara starts out 4-shanten with a lone dora 5s. On turn 4, Hagiwara’s potential hand value doubles when he pairs up the 5s with the red 5s double dora, paving the way for mangan. By the end of the first row, Hagiwara has his pair and two sequences secured, as well as a ryanmen for 2-shanten. After filling in the ryanmen and creating another one, Hagiwara gets to tenpai in the middle of the second row on a 69m wait, staying dama.
Right after, Mizuhara gets to tenpai and calls riichi on a 25s ryanmen for mangan minimum.
However, Mizuhara’s riichi ends up benefiting Hagiwara instead. At the end of the second row, Aki throws the 9m that is safe against Mizuhara and ends up dealing into Hagiwara. Hagiwara wins the hand with Pinfu/Dora 2/Aka 1 for 8,000 plus Mizuhara’s riichi stick to put him above 45,000.
Escaping 4th
April 28, Game 1
In S3-2, Okada is in 4th place, 16,300 behind 3rd place Aki and 19,600 behind 2nd place Mizuhara. With no more dealership left, she will either have win big or get some direct hits in these last two hands.
Okada starts out the hand with an annoying 5-shanten with no value to start out with. In the first row, Okada is able to clean hand of all it’s garbage and creates five distinct blocks, getting to 2-shanten by the end of the first row. By turn 7, Okada is iishanten with a guaranteed tanyao. While Okada is iishanten, so is Mizuhara. On turn 8, Mizuhara is able to pair up the red 5m double dora to get to tenpai and calls riichi on a 4s kanchan. If Mizuhara draws it herself, she would have hanmen and would move into 1st place.
During the ippatsu turn, Okada draws the south and is able to keep her hand safely. With each of her draws, she is able to shift her hand is such a way that she is able to stay safe at iishanten. Near the end of the second row, Mizuhara calls a closed kan, but it fails to bring any value to her hand. At the start of the third row, Okada finally gets to tenpai and calls riichi on a 6s/6m shanpon. During the ippatsu turn, Mizuhara draws and discards the 6s and deals into Okada. Okada wins the hand with Riichi/Ippatsu/Tanyao for 5,200+600 plus a riichi stick, getting her closer to escaping 4th.
Video: https://abema.tv/video/episode/444-14_s30_p741
In S4-0, Okada is now just 6,000 away from 3rd place Mizuhara, meaning that she needs a 3/30 direct hit, a 3/40 tsumo or a general 3/50 or 4/25 ron to move up in placement.
Okada starts out the hand 3-shanten with a three ryanmens, a red 5s and a dora 7m. With how her hand is now, she has the makings of a comeback hand. Okada’s hand quickly advances, getting to iishanten by turn 3. Frustratingly, the rest of the first row helps her. Neither does the second row. During this time, her opponents also gets close to tenpai, including Mizuhara. At the start of the third row, Mizuhara has the chance to take tenpai, but chooses to have five pairs and a 4p ankou instead, waiting for a good tile before she pares down her hand. During this time, Okada gets to tenpai and calls riichi on a 14p ryanmen. Initially, Mizuhara folds her hand. But when she has exhauster the most safe tiles, she is back to tenpai. With not much choice, Mizuhara discards the 4p and deals into Okada. Okada wins the hand with Riichi/Pinfu/Dora 1/Aka 1/Ura 1 for 8,000, enough to move into 3rd place.
Ippatsu
April 28, Game 2, E3-0
Video: https://abema.tv/video/episode/444-14_s80_p749
In E3-0, Kobayashi is in 4th place, 7,300 behind 2nd place Shibukawa and 9,300 behind 1st place dealer Kurosawa. With a mangn tsumo, Kobayashi will move into 1st place.
Kobayashi starts out the hand 3-shanten with a bunch of kanchans and bad shapes. As the hand goes on, Kobayashi fills thoses holes, from a 6p kanchan to a 5s kanchan to a 7s kanchan. By turn 10, Kobayashi is tenpai and calls riichi on a 36m ryanmen. On his very next draw, he finds the 3m and wins the hand. Kobayashi wins with Riichi/Ippatsu/Tsumo/Pinfu/Tanyao/Aka 1 for 3,000/6,000, easily moving into 1st place.
Kanchan Beats All
April 28, Game 2, S1-0
In S1-0, Shibukawa is in 3rd place, 3,800 behind 2nd place Kobayashi and 5,900 behind 1st place Kurosawa.
With Shibukawa’s starting hand, he is 2-shanten with a dora 6m. On turn 3, he draws another 6m to potentially increase his hand’s value. On turn 4, he draws a 6s. If Shibukawa draws a 5p and a 5s, he would have a 456 sanshoku. On turn 5, he gets to iishanten. Drawing the red 5p at the end of the first row, Shibukawa is tenpai on a 5s kanchan and stays dama on a mangan minimum.
At the start of the second row, Kobayashi makes the first call by calling riichi on a 69s ryanmen.
During the ippatsu round, Kurosawa gets to tenpai and calls riichi on a 9s tanki. If either Matsugase or Shibukawa discards the 9s, then Kurosawa would win and Kobayashi would get headbumped.
With two players in riichi, Shibukawa decides to guarantee haneman by calling riichi on his hand. Near the end of the second row, Kobayashi draws and discards the 5s and ends up dealing into Shibukawa. Shibukawa wins the hand with Riichi/Tanyao/Sanshoku/Dora 1/Aka 1 for 12,000 plus two riichi sticks, moving Shibukawa into 1st and Kobayashi into 4th.
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