Scott Kingery was poised to be the Phillies’ next star. Now he hopes to make the most of one more chance.

Scott Kingery watched the postseason from Clearwater, Fla., where he was stationed with the Phillies’ taxi squad. He felt happiness for his teammates, especially close pal Rhys Hoskins. But with each victory and champagne-drenched clubhouse party, there were other, more complicated emotions.

Jealousy? Maybe.

Envy? Without question.

Regret? A little bit.

“I felt like I could’ve been there,” Kingery said by phone this week, “if I would’ve just played better and not had some injuries.”

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Kingery’s story is well-known. A former second-round pick and Next Big Thing, he signed a six-year, $24 million contract in 2018 before playing in a major-league game. Talent evaluators compared him to another undersize second baseman from an Arizona college: Dustin Pedroia. He had a nickname (remember “Scotty Jetpax?”) and became a face of the Phillies’ rebuilding plan.

But Kingery was one of the worst hitters in the majors from 2018 to 2020, with a .677 OPS and 0.5 wins above replacement level. His five-alarm flameout continued when the Phillies optioned him to the minors in March 2021. They removed him from the 40-man roster two months later. A month after that, he had shoulder surgery and missed almost a year.

If the Phillies weren’t still paying Kingery — $8.25 million this year ($4 million against the luxury-tax threshold) — it would be easy to forget that he remains in the organization at all.

But here’s the thing: For all that he has gone through, Kingery is only 28. In three weeks, he will arrive in spring training as a nonroster invitee to major-league camp. And although he’s a Buster Douglas-level long shot to win a spot on the Phillies bench in the final guaranteed year of his infamous contract, well, stranger things have happened.

“If I’m being honest, it almost feels like some of the spring trainings I had before I signed the contract,” Kingery said. “It feels like I’m going in without those expectations. I remember those couple years before I had the contract. It was like, you’re here, you don’t know how long you’re going to be here for, so just go out there and show them what you can do. That’s kind of what it feels like going into this one.”

Kingery is literally playing with house money. He gets paid his major-league salary even in the minors. But he also wants to continue his career beyond this year, which will happen only if he’s able to reappear on the Phillies’ radar.

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Unfailingly candid about his struggles, Kingery said he’s had a healthy, uninterrupted offseason for the first time in years. Without a repaired shoulder to rehab or an owners lockout to prevent contact with team officials, he has visited Kevin Long’s lab in an effort to rediscover the hitter who won the Pac-12 batting title at Arizona and hit .304 with 29 doubles, 26 homers, and an .889 OPS between double A and triple A in 2017.

Long, the Phillies’ globetrotting hitting coach, likes to crisscross the country in the offseason to check in on players. But he lives near Kingery in the Phoenix area and has taken an up-close look at a swing that became a Frankenstein’s monster by the end of 2020. Rather than spraying line drives in the gaps and using his speed, Kingery focused on launching balls in the air. His swing grew long and loopy, and his strikeout rate soared to nearly 30%.

There were positive signs near the end of last season. Kingery batted .272 (22-for-81) with an .817 OPS in September at triple-A Lehigh Valley en route to an overall .230/.348/.371 line, with seven homers and 18 steals in 366 plate appearances. It took a while to “find that footing again” after being out for so long, but Kingery said he finally began feeling comfortable again after the All-Star break.

Still, he struck out nearly one-third of the time, far too much for a player who should focus on reaching base and utilizing his speed.

Long’s central message to Kingery: Simplify everything and allow that athleticism to take over.

“It’ll be a little bit different, for sure,” Kingery said, laughing about a new-look swing. “Sometimes you just get away from the athletic ability that you have as a player. You start thinking too much mechanically or looking into numbers, whatever it may be, and sometimes you’ve just got to get back to the roots of what made you a good, athletic player. That’s something that I’ve talked to K-Long about. He’s got me in a really good spot.”

As ever, Kingery knows the proof will be in the performance. And the Phillies, with a club-record payroll that projects to nearly $250 million, won’t have many available roster spots in spring training.

Health permitting — even with Bryce Harper sidelined for most of the first half while recovering from Tommy John elbow surgery — the lone non-pitching question is how they fill out the bench, with outfielder Dalton Guthrie and lefty-hitting Kody Clemens, Darick Hall, and Jake Cave likely vying for three spots.

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Kingery’s best chance might be to outplay Guthrie, a right-handed hitter who possesses many of the same skills as Kingery but has traveled an inverse path through the organization.

Like Kingery, Guthrie starred in college and came through the minors as a middle infielder before later adding the outfield to his portfolio. But while Kingery was a top prospect, Guthrie wasn’t added to the 40-man roster until he got called up late last season. Somehow, this year will mark the first time he’s even attending major-league camp in spring training.

“I think I have three at-bats in big-league games in spring training,” Guthrie said last week. “Hopefully I get some more this year.”

Manager Rob Thomson said he has “a lot of confidence in Dalton Guthrie,” who would occupy the role vacated when Matt Vierling got traded to the Detroit Tigers in the five-player deal for reliever Gregory Soto. But the Phillies could still add another right-handed hitter, likely on a minor-league contract, who can play center field.

Or maybe Kingery can morph back into Scotty Jetpax and satisfy that need.

“Scotty’s a highly talented guy,” Thomson said last week. “He’s gotten a little sideways there for a little bit. Maybe we can get him back and get him going.”

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Thomson has seen Kingery’s potential. He was the bench coach in 2018 when Kingery elbowed his way onto the team with the force of his play in spring training and his willingness to sign a long-term contract. Thomson was there in 2019, too, when Kingery batted .313 with 10 homers and a .948 OPS through the end of June.

Kingery has more history with Thomson than he did with Joe Girardi. He also worked with infield coach Bobby Dickerson in 2019, an experience that he calls “the best thing that ever happened for my infield game.”

“I feel like I’ve been through the downs with the Phillies [in 2018 and 2019],” Kingery said. “They finally put it all together last year. Right when it was over, I reached out to a lot of them and was like, ‘Man, that was so fun to watch. That was so cool.’

“It’s super exciting to just be able to show what I’ve been able to figure out this offseason and show what I’m capable of. It’s really cool to have a chance to be on a team that just made it to the World Series and looks like a team that’s going to be a perennial playoff team from here on out and show that I can be on the roster for a team of that caliber.”

It still isn’t too late for Kingery. Will he be the surprise of camp?

There’s always one.