Former La Mirada High star pitcher Jared Jones rebounds after missing 2025 season

By Loren Kopff
@LorenKopff on X

It’s hard to believe that one of the strongest baseball programs in the CIF-Southern Section, La Mirada High, has produced only a pair of pitchers who have played for a Major League Baseball team. But Jared Jones, a 2020 La Mirada graduate, is hoping to make the most of his opportunity despite missing all of 2025 because of a torn right UCL.

Jones was a second-round draft pick in the 2020 MLB Draft, selected by the Pittsburgh Pirates, and a year later was the #15 prospect in the organization. Three years later, he was the #3 prospect, and that season he made the Opening Day roster out of spring training. He made his debut on Mar. 30 at the Miami Marlins. He went five and a third innings, allowed three hits, three runs, walked two and struck out 10 as the Pirates won 9-3.

“It really wasn’t really a phone call; it was a spring training meeting,” said Jones about making the Opening Day roster. “I made the team out of camp. I got called into the office; our manager and GM told me I was making the team.

“It really wasn’t any different than another start day,” Jones later said of his MLB debut. “Obviously, I had a little bit more nerves because it was my debut and all. But I was just trying to keep it as similar as possible to any other game and went out there and pitched and ended up winning.”

Among the friends and family in attendance to see him make his debut was La Mirada head coach Jimmy Zurn.

“He was at my debut, and it was cool,” said Jones. “Obviously, it kind of shows the relationship that we had throughout high school and beyond. It was cool to see him out there.

“That was always a goal for me; to get drafted in high school,” he later said. “I just went there to have fun and play baseball, and I ended up getting drafted.”

This season has been different than his rookie season as Jones is trying to make up for missing the entire 2025 season after tearing his right UCL during spring training. He was placed on the 15-day injured list on Mar. 24, 2025, and transferred to the 60-day IL one week later.

“I kind of felt something a little bit off in spring training after one of my outings; the bullpen [session] didn’t really go too well, so I decided to get it checked out,” said Jones. “We ended up finding out there were some problems in the elbow. I was supposed to try to come back and rehab through it. It didn’t work, so I opted for surgery to make sure everything was all right when I do come back.”

He had surgery on May 21, and a year and eight days later, he was activated from the 60-day IL, making his season debut at PNC Park in Pittsburgh against the Minnesota Twins. In that game, Jones worked into the fourth inning, allowing seven hits and five runs while striking out six in a no-decision outing. In his next start six days later, Jones pitched five innings against the Houston Astros, scattering four hits and striking out four while not allowing a run in a 5-1 victory.

“It wasn’t fun; I gave up five runs, so it was cool to get the nerves over with,” said Jones of his 2026 debut. “And [I’m] not having a greatest year so far, so I’m just trying to get back on track. Yeah, it sucked; I kind of missed being around the guys, but I’m here now.”

So far this season, Jones is 2-6, has started 16 games, pitched over 72 innings, surrendered 66 hits and 39 runs, walked 27 and struck out 83. He is scheduled to start on Friday against the Los Angeles Angels. Recently, he started against the Los Angeles Dodgers in Chavez Ravine on Aug. 22 and pitched to a no-decision as the Pirates lost 5-4 in 10 innings. In his rookie season, he went six innings, allowed three hits, walked three and struck out six as he got the win against the Dodgers in a 1-0 contest.

“Yeah, it was cool,” said Jones of facing the Dodgers a few weeks ago. “A lot of my family hasn’t seen me pitch since I signed in 2020 and it was pretty cool to have them all out, especially at the stadium where we grew up going to every year. So, it was pretty fun.”

Jones made 22 starts in his rookie season, finishing with a 6-8 record, striking out 132 and walking only 39 while sporting a 4.14 earned run average. One could say that his rookie season probably made up for not completing his senior season with the Matadores. His senior season was cut short after three starts because of COVID-19. In the three games he appeared in, he pitched 17 innings, struck out 28 and walked half a dozen. For his La Mirada career, he went 20-6 with seven complete games, five shutouts, struck out 255 and walked 78 batters. His better seasons were in 2018 and 2019 when he combined to go 14-3 in 24 games and struck out 193 batters.

“We won a lot of games,” said Jones. “A bunch of guys who I grew up with and [being] on the same high school baseball team was pretty fun. We were pretty good.

“There’s only one high school in that city, so I guess if you live inside the city, you more than likely are going to that high school,” he later added. “I feel like we’ve always had a pretty good sports program there and people from outside of La Mirada want to end up going there for sports.”

During his four seasons at La Mirada, the team went 56-17-1 and again, it’s hard to believe that Jones is the first La Mirada player under Zurn’s watch to have played for an MLB team despite the dominance of the Matadores. Since Jones graduated, the program has gone 134-40-1 and has won at least 21 games each time.

“There weren’t really words of encouragement; he just let me go out there and play,” said Jones of Zurn. “We had really good teams in high school and there weren’t really too many talks of encouragement. We just went out there and won.”

After the start Jones had to the 2020 season, it’s hard to believe it was cut so short because of the pandemic. Considering what he had done in his sophomore and junior seasons, Jones was already on pace to have a stellar senior season. Despite COVID beginning in the middle of March, Jones believes that it had no bearing on the draft or where he got selected.

“I don’t really think it affected the draft,” said Jones. “I felt like I could prove that what I did in years before that I’m a pretty good baseball player. So, I don’t think it affected me too much. But having a season cut short because of a virus or whatever you want to call it wasn’t very fun for either me or my teammates. That could have been their last year of playing baseball and it got cut short.”

With less than a month remaining in the regular season, the Pirates are five and a half games out of the final wild card spot. Pittsburgh has not made the playoffs since 2015 when it lost to the Chicago Cubs 4-0. Jones is hoping he and fellow teammates Braxton Ashcraft, Bubba Chandler, Oneil Cruz, Bryan Reynolds and Paul Skenes can end the team’s playoff drought.

“We have a bunch of really good guys around here, so it’s easy to root for people,” said Jones. “I think we’re a pretty good baseball team, and stuff really hasn’t gone our way this year. But luckily, we have a lot of guys coming back next year; not too many roster changes will need to happen. We’re just trying to get the guys healthy throughout the year and keep them there. Next year will be a lot better than this one.”