{"id":308875,"date":"2026-05-26T06:45:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-26T06:45:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/308875\/"},"modified":"2026-05-26T06:45:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-26T06:45:11","slug":"houston-astros-pitchers-combine-for-first-no-hitter-in-mlb-since-2024-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/308875\/","title":{"rendered":"Houston Astros pitchers combine for first no-hitter in MLB since 2024"},"content":{"rendered":"

Houston Astros right-hander Tatsuya Imai and relievers Steven Okert<\/a> and Alimber Santa<\/a> combined to throw a no-hitter<\/a> in a 9-0 win over the Texas Rangers on Monday night.<\/p>\n

It was the first no-hitter in the major leagues since Shota Imanaga<\/a> and two Chicago Cubs<\/a> relievers combined for a 12-0 win over Pittsburgh<\/a> on Sept. 4, 2024. No pitcher has tossed a complete-game no-hitter since Blake Snell<\/a> for the San Francisco Giants<\/a> against Cincinnati<\/a> on Aug. 2, 2024.<\/p>\n

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The 23-year-old Santa fired two perfect innings and became the first pitcher to finish a no-hitter in his big league debut.<\/p>\n

Imai went six innings in the 17th regular-season no-hitter in Astros history and fourth that was a combined effort. Houston also threw a no-hitter in the 2022 World Series when four pitchers combined against Philadelphia<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ronel Blanco<\/a> tossed the most recent no-hitter for the Astros in a 10-0 victory over Toronto<\/a> on April 1, 2024. In fact, Houston has authored three of the past seven major league no-hitters; Framber Valdez<\/a> shut down Cleveland<\/a> 2-0 on Aug. 1, 2023.<\/p>\n

Okert worked the seventh after Imai got 16 outs over the last 16 batters he faced. He walked three of his first four batters but benefited from a double play in the first inning before settling into a groove.<\/p>\n

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Santa entered in the eighth and retired all six batters he faced. His 24th pitch was a called third strike against Brandon Nimmo<\/a> that ended it after an ABS challenge by the batter was confirmed a strike.<\/p>\n

The Rangers were held without a hit for the sixth time, the first since Corey Kluber<\/a> threw a no-hitter against them for the New York Yankees<\/a> on May 19, 2021.<\/p>\n

Imai\u2019s fourth walk of the night was to Nimmo leading off the fourth inning, but Ezequiel Duran<\/a> then grounded into a double play.<\/p>\n

Imai threw 57 of his 97 pitches for strikes. He struck out two.<\/p>\n

The 28-year-old Imai is in his first big league season after coming over from Japan. He was 1-2 with an 8.31 ERA in his first five starts for the Astros.<\/p>\n

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Imai joined the Astros in January after agreeing to a $54 million, three-year contract. He was a three-time All-Star during eight seasons in Japan, and went 10-5 with a 1.92 ERA last season for the Pacific League\u2019s Seibu Lions, striking out 178 in 163 2\/3 innings.<\/p>\n

Rangers leadoff hitter Joc Pederson<\/a> was retired on a nifty play in the third when shortstop Jeremy Pe\u00f1a<\/a> made a backhand stop and a twisting throw to first for the out. Justin Foscue<\/a> and Danny Jansen<\/a> had deep flyouts in the Texas<\/a> fifth.<\/p>\n

Okert walked Nimmo leading off the seventh before retiring the next three batters.<\/p>\n

For more CNN news and newsletters create an account at CNN.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Houston Astros right-hander Tatsuya Imai and relievers Steven Okert and Alimber Santa combined to throw a no-hitter in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":308876,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[111535,2792,111532,32775,32457,9914,1689,91568,84825,39233,38602,56,58,57,90584,63983,84002,21176,11720,41910,91669,61104,48645,111533,48568,27,429,11724],"class_list":["post-308875","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-houston","tag-alimber-santa","tag-astros","tag-blake-snell","tag-brandon-nimmo","tag-chicago-cubs","tag-cincinnati","tag-cleveland","tag-corey-kluber","tag-danny-jansen","tag-ezequiel-duran","tag-framber-valdez","tag-houston","tag-houston-headlines","tag-houston-news","tag-jeremy-pena","tag-joc-pederson","tag-justin-foscue","tag-new-york-yankees","tag-philadelphia","tag-pittsburgh","tag-ronel-blanco","tag-san-francisco-giants","tag-shota-imanaga","tag-steven-okert","tag-tatsuya-imai","tag-texas","tag-texas-rangers","tag-toronto"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308875","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=308875"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308875\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/308876"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=308875"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=308875"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=308875"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}