Yet despite a place on the 40-man roster, Grissom has watched as other infielders, including Marcelo Mayer, Abraham Toro, David Hamilton, and Nate Eaton, have shuttled between Triple A and the big leagues. Grissom has reached a conclusion.

“Sometimes you just feel like, ‘I’m playing good enough to compete in the show.’ I don’t feel like I deserve it, but I feel like I’m ready,” said Grissom. “[But] I got to a point where I just accepted that I’m not in the plans for the team. There’s been a couple of times where it feels a little personal.

“But I understand that decisions are made for probably the right reasons, and I have to just believe that and just accept what it is and attack every day as it comes, and not try to look into what might be in the future. So, just being where my feet are and sucking it up and trying to play every day to win for this team [in Worcester].”

Triple A is a level of restlessness. More than any stop in the minors, the goal is to leave — with tantalizing proximity to Fenway Park amplifying awareness of the divide between where a player is and where he wants to go.

Yet players recognize they won’t go anywhere unless they show the traits needed to compete in the big leagues. For Grissom, there has been reason to feel encouraged by what’s transpired in 2025, particularly in contrast to what came before it.

A year ago, Grissom — still under a microscope in his first season with the Sox, following a trade from Atlanta for eventual National League Cy Young winner Chris Sale — was underwater.

The trade itself was dizzying, not just because of the change in organizations but also because it entailed a new defensive identity (after mostly playing shortstop with the Braves, he only played second base in 2024 for the Sox) and offensive approach.

“I came to this organization, and I was almost in a way trying to make [myself] someone that I wasn’t ready to be in a way,” said Grissom. “I wasn’t able to just go out there and play. I was trying to swing hard, because they valued it. They thought I made enough contact [that] if I swing hard enough … I wasn’t ready for that. And then the flu came, and I knocked 20 pounds off.”

The flu was part of a succession of physical woes — a spring hamstring injury, the illness resulting in significant weight and strength loss as he was about to get a run as the Sox’ everyday second baseman, then another hamstring injury — that left Grissom physically depleted for much of 2024.

Grissom lacked strength and burst in his movements. He was mostly in baseball survival mode.

“I was in a hole, and it’s dark,” said Grissom. “Obviously, you’re trying to compete against the guys that are here, and you’re trying to work hard and do everything you can, but my body wasn’t ready last year, and that’s it. And they roll you out and expect you to perform, and it’s tough, but it is an opportunity, so you can make the best of it, but it’s tough whenever you’re not actually physically ready.”

This year, Grissom is up to the physical demands of the game. He leads the WooSox with 88 games. He’s held his weight — a sturdy 220 pounds — all year. The return to games at shortstop, he feels, has freed him defensively, allowing him to rip throws across the infield and to return to natural footwork. And he feels like he’s gotten back to an approach that best suits him, making more regular hard contact (his hard-hit rate is 41 percent, up not only from the 31 percent he posted in Triple A in 2024 but also the 37 percent he had in 2023, preceding the trade).

Grissom is pulling the ball in the air with greater frequency in 2025, but feels he’s doing so while not trying to force that outcome. He declined to go too much further into his offensive approach.

“I can’t give that away, [because] I’ll probably be playing against [the Red Sox] here soon. Who knows?” he laughed. “I just feel like I got back to myself. Even earlier this year, there was some talk about trying to do different things and trying different approaches, and none of it really felt like it was authentic to me. I feel like I got to a spot where I was playing my game, and then the game that I know how to play, and figured out how to do it my way and still have the success that they’re looking for.”

That hasn’t been enough to earn a return to the big leagues with the Red Sox. And so, with Thursday’s trade deadline looming, Grissom’s curiosity is piqued. Could he be on the move with an immediate chance to play at the game’s highest level? Grissom recognizes he neither has nor controls the answer.

“I’m just where my feet are and ready for my next opportunity, wherever it is. Hopefully, it’s here,” said Grissom. “And if it’s not, if I’m not in their plans, then whatever, I go somewhere else and hopefully I have an opportunity there. And if not, I just have to be where my feet are and grind and get ready for 2026.”

Alex Speier can be reached at alex.speier@globe.com. Follow him @alexspeier.