Tatsuya Imai walked three of his first four batters tonight, loaded the bases in the first inning against the Texas Rangers, and got bailed out when someone hit into a double play. He then pitched five more hitless innings, walked a fourth batter, and got pulled. Steven Okert came in, walked a fifth Rangers batter, and worked through the seventh. Alimber Santa threw two perfect innings in his MLB debut and closed it out.
The Houston Astros threw a combined no-hitter. Five walks. Three strikeouts. Three pitchers. MLB is putting it in the record books.
It is not a no-hitter.
Yes, MLB counts it as one. It’s officially in the record books. Tatsuya Imai gets a no-hitter next to his name. Come on.
What Happened Tonight in Arlington Was Not a No-Hitter
Three pitchers held the Texas Rangers hitless for nine innings. Tatsuya Imai started, loaded the bases in the first inning, and pitched six hitless frames before being pulled. Steven Okert and Alimber Santa finished it. The Rangers walked five times and struck out three. Zero hits. That is a hitless game. It is not a no-hitter.
The Rangers had five baserunners tonight without putting a ball in play for a hit. They loaded the bases in the very first inning. They had every chance in the world to score and went home with zero runs, which tells you everything about where the Texas offense is right now but nothing about whether what the Astros did qualifies as a no-hitter.
Imai settled in after that first inning disaster. He was genuinely locked in for stretches. Six innings, zero hits allowed, and after loading the bases against the first four batters he faced, he looked like a different pitcher. That is worth acknowledging. But Imai did not throw a no-hitter. He threw six hitless innings and got pulled because that is what the modern game looks like. Okert threw one hitless inning. Santa threw two perfect ones in his first major league appearance. Together, across nine innings, they did not allow a hit.
That is a real thing. It just is not a no-hitter. And the fact that MLB calls it one is the problem.
The Combined No-Hitter Doesn’t Pass the Perfect Game Test
If a pitcher gives up a walk in the first inning and the next batter hits into a double play, nobody calls it a perfect game. The same logic applies here. A no-hitter belongs to one pitcher who goes nine innings without allowing a hit. Three pitchers sharing the work is a different accomplishment. It deserves a different name.
Think about it this way. A perfect game is 27 batters, 27 outs, nobody reaches base. If a guy leads off with a single and the next batter hits into a double play, you do not get to call it a perfect game and say it was 27 up, 27 down. Someone reached base. The achievement was broken the moment it happened, regardless of how the inning ended. You do not get to erase it retroactively because things worked out.
The same principle applies to no-hitters. The achievement belongs to one pitcher. That is the whole point of it. When Imai got pulled after six, his no-hitter attempt ended. What happened after was Okert and Santa doing their jobs well. A hitless seventh, eighth, and ninth by two other pitchers does not retroactively extend Imai’s no-hitter attempt. It extends the game. The game finished without a hit. That is true. But Imai’s no-hitter ended the moment he walked off the mound.
MLB does not apply this logic to perfect games. Nobody will ever stand in front of a microphone and say four pitchers combined for a perfect game, because the entire concept collapses under that framing. If three pitchers combined for 27 outs with nobody reaching base, we would call it an impressive team effort and leave it there. The reason nobody has ever called that a perfect game is because everyone understands that the individual accomplishment is the point.
No-hitters used to work the same way.
The Last Real No-Hitter Was Almost a Year Ago
Blake Snell threw a complete game no-hitter for the San Francisco Giants against the Cincinnati Reds on August 2, 2024. That is the last time one pitcher went nine innings without allowing a hit in a major league game. Every no-hitter since has been a combined effort. MLB counts them identically. They are not identical.
Since Snell, every “no-hitter” in the record books has been a combined effort. The one before tonight was Shota Imanaga and two Cubs relievers against Pittsburgh in September 2024. That counted. Tonight counts. All of them sit in the same column in the same record books alongside what Nolan Ryan did seven times.
Ryan’s seven no-hitters are the all-time record. Three more than any other pitcher in baseball history. Every single one of them was a complete game. Ryan stood on that mound for nine innings seven different times and refused to let any lineup get to him for a hit. That is what earned the record. That is what earned the legacy.
Tatsuya Imai’s name is now in those record books too, alongside Ryan’s and Snell’s and every other pitcher who ever got 27 outs without allowing a hit. Imai got 18 of those outs. Okert got three. Santa got six. MLB decided that adds up to the same thing.
It does not add up to the same thing.
The problem compounds every time a starter gets pulled in the sixth and two relievers do exactly what relievers are supposed to do. The bar for a no-hitter is not supposed to be “several pitchers held a lineup hitless.” It is supposed to be one of the most difficult individual achievements in the sport. One pitcher, alone, for nine innings, refusing to give up a hit no matter how deep into the game it gets, no matter how many times he has seen the lineup, no matter how tired his arm is in the eighth.
That is the real no-hitter. The one where the tension builds because you know the same guy is going back out there, the lineup has seen him twice already, and everyone in the stadium is wondering if he can hold on. That feeling does not exist in a combined effort because the starter is gone and three relievers are doing what three relievers always do.
Tonight, Alimber Santa went out for the eighth inning of his MLB career, which was also the first two innings of his MLB career, and got credit for a no-hitter.
Santa threw a nice debut. He should be proud. And nobody at hailmary.media is taking anything away from what he or Imai or Okert did tonight. They held a major league lineup hitless for nine innings. That is hard to do regardless of how many people were involved.
