Tigers' key bench player garnering interest for WBC as feel-good season unfolds

Signing Jahmai Jones to a minor league contract in the offseason has sort of ended up being one of the sneakier impactful moves of the Tigers' 2025 season. Jones was already a standout in spring training, but he's become a key bench bat since replacing Andy Ibáñez on the roster in early June. Ibáñez wasn't hitting lefty pitchers the way he used to, and then Jones came up and seamlessly slotted into that role.

In his very first at-bat as a Tiger, he cranked a homer off of lefty Cubs reliever Génesis Cabrera to give Detroit some extra reassurance in what was before a 2-1 game.

Through 50 games, he's still challenging lefties, with a .250 average and .863 OPS in 83 plate appearances against them. All of his homers and 75% of his RBI have come against them. Bringing him in during late innings also clearly works (.333 average and 1.378 OPS).

His unlikely effectiveness has earned some international recognition. During the Tigers' broadcast on Wednesday, announcer Jason Benetti noted that Jones had expressed interest in participating in the World Baseball Classic for South Korea (his mother is of Korean descent).

Jon Morosi added that Team Korea were evaluating Jones for a spot on next year's WBC roster.

Tigers' Jahmai Jones throws his hat in the ring to compete for Team Korea in 2026 World Baseball Classic

In 2023, Team Korea carried a number of current and future MLB players, including Tommy Edman, Ha-Seong Kim, Hyeseong Kim, Jung-Hoo Lee, and Woo-Suk Go (now also a Tiger), but they didn't progress past pool play and suffered a 13-4 loss to their main rivals in Team Japan.

Ibáñez is back on the major league roster and has slowly gotten back to his lefty-killing ways, but Jones is still the standout in that department. He also fits nicely with the Tigers' fondness for utility players, having gotten appearances at second base and the outfield corners so far this year.

Teams have historically been hesitant to allow their players to participate in extraneous tournaments, fearing injuries like the one Mets closer Edwin Díaz suffered while celebrating during the 2023 WBC. However, Jones doesn't seem destined to become an everyday player that the Tigers need to be overly precious about, and his contributions in the regular season have more than made an argument for his participation.