Phillies shut down Scott Kingery for season’s last two games because of mysterious blurred vision

Before he looks ahead to 2020, Scott Kingery wants to see clearly again.

Kingery left Friday night’s game with blurry vision and wasn’t in the lineup Saturday night against the Miami Marlins. He won’t play in Sunday’s season finale, either, and will undergo a vision test Monday to help determine the cause of the problem.

“It’s tough, really tough,” Kingery said. “With a couple of games left, it’s obviously not ideal. But I think it’s just something I want to get taken care of as soon as possible and figure out what the problem is.”

Kingery said the issue has been “creeping up” over the last few days. Manager Gabe Kapler said that Kingery dealt with “some pink-eye stuff” during the Phillies’ recently completed 11-game, 10-day road trip, but it isn’t believed to be related to the blurriness that he is experiencing.

Kingery joined catcher J.T. Realmuto (knee surgery), shortstop Jean Segura (sprained ankle), and left fielder Jay Bruce (elbow soreness) as active players who are injured and unable to play in the final games of the season. With Segura and Kingery out, Sean Rodriguez started at shortstop while Malvern Prep product Phil Gosselin got the start in left field.

Despite a rough final month of the season in which he went 17-for-89 (.191), with four home runs and a .625 on-base plus slugging percentage, Kingery rates as one of the Phillies’ most improved hitters this season. He finished with a .258 average, 34 doubles, 19 homers, 15 stolen bases, and a .788 OPS, and played five positions, including 61 games in center field.

“I like the way I improved a lot, defensively and offensively,” Kingery said. “Obviously it’s not how, as a team, we wanted to finish it. I think there’s definitely still some things to work on, but I think I just kind of became more of the player that I knew I could play as, compared to last year. Kind of did some things that I knew I was capable of, rather than kind of just tumble and crash like last year.”

There’s no question that Kingery figures in the Phillies’ plans for next season, but what position will he play? Will he return to his natural second base, or will he fill potential holes at third base or center field? Will the Phillies commit to one position for Kingery or continue to move him around the field?

“It’s incredibly valuable to an organization for Scott Kingery to be able to play multiple positions, because then you can fill holes, and Scott can fill the holes you haven’t filled," Kapler said. "That’s one way to look at it. Another ... is, we don’t have an alternate universe. So if you ran Scott out to second base or shortstop or third base every single day, we don’t know what kind of numbers he’d put up. We don’t know if he’d be the Gold Glove winner at that position.”

Before any of that, though, Kingery must solve the mystery of his vision problems.

"It got to a point where I was just like, ‘It’s tough to see,’ " Kingery said. “Honestly, it’s just blurry. I’m still not sure what it is. That’s why I’m going to go get an exam, and hopefully, it can just give me an answer when I go.”

For baseball fans, Bryce Harper’s jersey was the second-most popular this season, according to MLB and the players’ union. New York Yankees slugger Aaron Judge finished with the top-selling jersey. ... With attendance of 2.67 million fans entering last night, the Phillies will finish the season with their highest total since 2013, the last time they topped the 3-million mark. ... Right-hander Enyel De Los Santos, who had been throwing at the Phillies’ spring-training facility in Clearwater, Fla., joined the team for the final two games of the season to provide an extra arm in the bullpen. ... The Phillies will use a cast of relievers, beginning with Blake Parker, in the season finale against Marlins right-hander Sandy Alcantara (5-14, 3.95 ERA).