With Yordano Ventura struggling and Jason Vargas requiring Tommy John surgery after tearing his UCL, the Kansas City Royals are in serious need of starting pitching. Help could be on the way and it could come in the form of a familiar face.

James Shields is rumored to be available from the San Diego Padres if they decide to sell this deadline, which they likely will given the fact they entered Thursday 9.5 games out of first place. If he is, in fact, on the move, he would make a lot of sense for the defending American League champions.

The Royals couldn’t afford to re-sign Shields this offseason, so why would they want him at the deadline? There are a couple reasons.

Perhaps the biggest reason is that Kansas City is desperate. They know that they have a unique opportunity to compete for a World Series this season. Even after playing in the Fall Classic last season, the Royals aren’t going to take a chance like this for granted. With the chance to contend, adding Shields would only make them more deadly in October.

In addition, the Padres are already regretting all the spending they did this offseason and trying to purge themselves of salary to limit the damage. That means they could be willing to eat a small portion of Shields’ contract in a trade.

Kansas City should have no problem paying Shields’ remaining contract this season, but they likely wouldn’t want to pay the $21 million annual salary he’s owed in each of the next two seasons.

If the Padres take $5 million off the top of that, though, he would be at a manageable $16 million per season. The Royals may have paid that much money for him in free agency if he would have returned for that amount. Shields can also opt out of his contract following the 2016 season. That means if he re-establishes his value in Kansas City, he can opt out and get long-term security elsewhere.

The Royals are in search of pitching this deadline, and “Big Game James” is on the market. They could reunite this trade deadline and perhaps the results, for both Shields and the Royals, will be a little different this season than last.