OK, here's the deal.
In the Editor, I set Enron to CA 190, PA 200, Current Rep to 175, and attacking to 18. After starting a new game, your stats are attacking 14, defending 16.
Take Eden Hazard for example. I set his CA to 150, PA to 200, current rep 114, crossing 17, dribbling 17, passing 17, and technique 17. After loading the game, his stats are 15 for all of said attributes. Although, I set flair to 16 and 16 is showing up in the game.
So this leads me to believe that the stats set in the editor are not Current Ability and the game just generates ballpark numbers instead, unless I'm missing something.