One quiet move, one loud implication: Luke Weaver’s deal may have just revealed where the Mets and Padres are really headed in trade talks.NL

The New York Mets and San Diego Padres are still great trade partners in so many ways that if they don’t end up striking some sort of a deal, someone was being too greedy or stubborn. The Padres have the pitching the Mets need. The Mets have the young player capital the Padres desire. It’s way too perfect. The Padres give up better quality for more quantity and control.

The Mets didn’t waste their time sitting around for the Padres to offer them added bullpen punch. They will sign Luke Weaver to a 2-year deal worth $22 million. In doing so, they offered a hint of how their negotiations with the Padres might be going.

It doesn’t seem like Mason Miller is coming to the Mets

Could the Mets add Mason Miller even after signing Weaver? It’s not unrealistic. Move Weaver down a notch and ask him to work the sixth and seventh alongside Devin Williams who’ll also drop down the depth chart. It’s a power move to get Miller in the first place. He is well on his way to being the best closer in baseball if he isn’t already.

The idea of trading for Miller has held Mets fans captive for a few days even though the cost would have been too extreme to stomach. It would have cost New York at least three significant prospects just to land him. In addition, they’d be shelling out more for the other player(s) San Diego would send over.

It doesn’t seem so practical any longer for the Mets to pay the piper and add Miller, not that it ever was realistic enough to etch in stone. The mere fact that the Padres would listen on trade proposals for him should come as a surprise. He’s cheap, awesome, and exactly what they should look to build around. Their other more expensive pitchers are what they should be trading away instead, headlined by starter Nick Pivetta.

Fellow relievers Adrian Morejon and Jeremiah Estrada now seem far more likely to come to New York. It wouldn’t be too outrageous for others to be included as well. San Diego has an incredibly deep bullpen and can afford sacrifices. The Mets, who should be willing to make some of their own, have the bullpen space to improve themselves by even adding some of the weaker or riskier Padres bullpen options.

Big, small, or somewhere in between, the Mets and Padres are going to come to terms on a trade. Miller just won’t be a part of it and not because Erik Kratz thinks it’ll require the addition of Xander Bogaerts, too.