There doesn't need to be a correspondence between player and character's choices: I can choose my character to be naturally blonde, 2 meters tall etc. things that would be outside the realm of choices of the character itself. Does my half orc start with a 14 in Str instead of 16? Perhaps he was born scrawnier than most. Does he have 10 in Int instead of 14? He may not be as gifted as others, needing to spend much more time and effort to get to the same level, even if he puts his all in it.