3 San Diego Padres players who are proving their spring training stats were a fluke

The San Diego Padres are in the midst of an incredibly frustrating season. Following an NLCS appearance, the Friars enter Thursday at 35-39, fourth in the NL West and outside of the National League playoff picture. In April, it was too early to freak out ... but at the end of June? This team has to wake up eventually.

Part of what has made this season so frustrating is that the talent is there. This team looks awfully similar to the one that finished three games away from a NL pennant and even added both Xander Bogaerts and Fernando Tatis Jr.

While the Padres are still in postseason contention and can easily squeak in, they've made the path difficult for themselves. A couple of good weeks in a row will see this team go from under .500 to maybe five or six games over. One thing that has been clear, though, is that what we saw from many players in spring training, both good and bad, is not what we've gotten this season.

Here are three Padres players showing you that Spring Training records and stats are meaningless.

1) Padres outfielder Trent Grisham proved his hot spring was a fluke

After the debacle of last regular season, I think most Padres fans, even the spring stats believers, needed to see more from Trent Grisham to show that he could be a good offensive player for the Padres.

Even while we wanted to see more, there's no denying that Grisham looked really solid this spring. Slashing .271/.357/.604 with four home runs and 12 RBI, Grisham was one of the better hitters among all Padres players as he led the team in both home runs and RBI. After a decent start to the regular season, unfortunately, Grisham has reverted back to the frustrating player he was in 2022.

The center fielder is slashing .204/.313/.358 with six home runs and 18 RBI. At least he's hitting above .200? Grisham has been better than he was in 2021, but a .671 OPS and an 89 OPS+ is not good for an everyday player.

Grisham needed 48 at-bats to hit four home runs in Spring Training. He's had 226 at-bats, appearing in 70 of San Diego's 74 games, and has just six home runs. Nearly 200 at-bats to hit two more home runs is simply not good enough.

2) Padres infielder Jake Cronenworth proved his hot spring was a fluke

If Trent Grisham wasn't the Padres best hitter this spring, then Jake Cronenworth was. Cronenworth slashed .396/.453/.688 with two home runs and seven RBI in his 18 games played. He led the team in hits and doubles while walking (five walks) nearly as many times as he struck out (six strikeouts) in 48 at-bats.

Obviously nobody expected Cronenworth to hit .400, but he was among the top 10 in all of baseball in hits this spring, and as a two-time All-Star, you hoped he'd maybe have a career year. It's been anything but for the Padres infielder.

Cronenworth is slashing .211/.313/.360 with seven home runs and 25 RBI in his 73 games. Cronenworth had six doubles in 48 at-bats this spring and has just 10 in 261 at-bats in the regular season. It's been that kind of year for him.

Cronenworth's .673 OPS is a career low by far, and he's shown no real signs of breaking out of this funk, recording just three hits in his last 19 at-bats.

Cronenworth went from an All-Star in back-to-back seasons to a guy who has an OPS+ of 90. His .673 OPS is two points better than Grisham. It hasn't been pretty.