Tony Fernandez was a far superior player to Isiah Kiner-Falefa.

That is not a sentence you expected to read today, right?

Let’s see if I can connect the dots.

Fernandez had been the primary shortstop on the 1995 Yankees — the organization’s first playoff team since 1981. Fernandez did not play well in 1995. He was down from his Gold Glove Blue Jays peak. But I am comfortable writing this sentence regardless of the difference in age or the difference in Wins Above Replacement: I would take Fernandez going into 1996 over Kiner-Falefa going into 2023.