Pirates' Jared Jones avoids ligament damage, could resume throwing in six weeks, per report

Over a week ago, Pirates right-handed starting pitcher Jared Jones was shut down due to discomfort in his pitching elbow. Pirates manager Derek Shelton informed the media of this on March 19. Given that, the update to his status reported Tuesday qualifies as good news. 

Jones will not need surgery and does not have ligament damage, but will need to wait six weeks until he can resume throwing, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. 

Again, Jones not having ligament damage and avoiding surgery is basically Jones and the Pirates avoiding disaster here with the talented, young pitcher. It is obviously far from ideal to have him not throwing for six weeks, which means once he picks up a ball again, he's starting over. He'd probably need at least a month then to rejoin the Pirates' rotation, so consider him out at least 10 weeks and maybe even 12. 

Regardless, at this point his 2025 season isn't over and that's good to hear. 

Jones, 23, debuted March 30 last year, just under four years since being drafted in the second round out of high school. In 22 starts, he was 6-8 with a 4.14 ERA (101 ERA+), 1.19 WHIP and 132 strikeouts in 121 ⅔ innings. He posted 1.7 WAR. 

The Pirates top their rotation with star youngster Paul Skenes, who is the favorite for the NL Cy Young this season. Behind him is Mitch Keller, who was an All-Star in 2023, so the hope for this season was to have a three-headed monster atop the rotation with Skenes, Keller and Jones. 

The Pirates will have to do without Jones for a while, but at least he isn't headed under the knife and waiting until 2026.