 He was not fit enough to play his first match for Carlton until Round 16 of that year.His nickname "Percy" was bestowed upon him by Murray Gallagher, the uncle of his best mate, the rover Adrian "Gags" Gallagher (known as "Golly" until he started to lose his hair), after "Percy" the name of the enormous penis that was transplanted onto the injured man in the 1971 film Percy.Jones was later to capitalise further on this anatomical allusion when he stood as a Liberal Party candidate for election to the Lower House of the Victorian Parliament in the early 1980s, with the slogan "Point Percy at Parliament"

At the beginning of his career, he often had to suffer the competitiveness of John Nicholls, who clearly understood Jones' potential.