The playoffs force you to be brutally honest about your team, and for the Toronto Raptors, it is always a painful experience.

This year showed, without a shadow of a doubt, that there is a defined ceiling on this current core. Every circumstance worked in their favor but it didn’t matter. They upgraded just about every supporting piece, modernized the offense, won home-court advantage, and caught all the rest and health they could possibly ask for, and still fell to the same struggle. Now they’re trying to change the head coach, but nobody should be surprised if the result is the same.

The bottom line is the two main players in DeMar DeRozan and Kyle Lowry can’t elevate their games, so it forces you to compromise.

DeRozan’s flaws are more obvious. He’s a poor shooter so the Raptors have to open the floor with with catch-and-shoot pieces. He is prone to tunnel vision (especially in the DeRozan and bench units) so he needs a secondary creator by his side. He’s an unwilling defender, so he needs to always be hidden on a weak match-up while a strong wing defender takes his man. He can get you a tough bucket, but he also needs a coach to keep him from only hunting for tough buckets.

Lowry is a much more complete player on paper, but he’s limited by height, ability, and increasing age. He is a master of maximizing the margins, yet he cannot be the leading man to dictate outcomes. You can see it during crunch time with how much he defers. His compromise is DeRozan — he needs someone else to be the №1 option — and so he inherits the limitations of those same flaws.

Both players can shrink from adversity in the form of the opponent or the referee, and respond by making a string of bad decisions that leaves the team in shambles. They have historically needed someone else to supply a mentality of toughness, whether it was PJ Tucker, Bismack Biyombo, or even Fred VanVleet. Not only do they lack confidence in themselves, but from afar, it seems corrupt the faith of their teammates. Speaking strictly as a fan, it’s hard to believe in these two.

Toronto is also in a bind, since recruiting stars to play north of the border is remains nearly impossible. Nobody ever comes on a discount — Tucker even took less to leave — and the Raptors lack the gravitational star to recruit more talent. Squandering their last few glimpses of cap room by splurging on DeMarre Carroll and Serge Ibaka didn’t help matters, especially since a lack of high draft picks restricted other avenues for acquiring stars. And so they’re stuck with elevating these two big fishes in this small pond.

Enough reports have suggested that Lowry and DeRozan are held to a different standard (whether it’s DeRozan not playing defense, Lowry’s clashes with coaches, or the two of them taking Ubers without the other players) while also receiving top dollar and every possible marketing resource. There’s a leeway and advantage that comes with playing in Toronto, and that liberty is taken to its fullest with their two stars. And while nobody should fault them for getting theirs, it serves as a reminder that players of this quality are only afforded these chances here.

That’s not to say DeRozan and Lowry aren’t good leaders, because that would be bastardizing the truth to push a narrative. They just happen to live in the limbo of being good but not good enough. Both players organized training sessions with the young players over the summer, and they have been ideal representatives for the organization as two good citizens. DeRozan and Lowry gave this historically dysfunctional franchise a structure to build around, and while it’s far short of a championship foundation, they legitimized the team which is no small feat. (The same can be said of Dwane Casey.)

They have done the job that was asked of them, but it’s not their fault if that job suddenly changed to include beating LeBron James. On that front they are certainly not enough, but can you really blame them? This was a team on the brink of of a rebuild; on that front they’ve exceeded expectations and nobody should be disappointed.

But if the only goal left is to challenge and usurp James, then you cannot make so many compromises. There’s no point in shuffling supporting pieces in hopes of marginal advantages, because that comes secondary to what DeRozan and Lowry lack in comparison to James. The very elite players in this league (James, Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant, Anthony Davis, James Harden) allow for a team to play a defined style around a singular talent that DeRozan and Lowry lack, and that specific point is not negotiable.

The Cavaliers can account for James’ lack of shooting ability by surrounding him with one-dimensional gunners because he makes up for the rest. The Warriors and Rockets can collect shutdown defenders to make up for Curry and Harden because they can averaged an efficient 35 points per game if needed. And for what they might lack, star players can attract more to join them, as with the case of Curry with Durant (and eventually Davis) or Harden with Chris Paul. The Raptors can’t ever build a supporting cast that is enough because DeRozan and Lowry lack the elite talent to serve as a reliable playoff foundation. And because they lack elite talent, they cannot attract others to join them.

This problem is hardly unique to the Raptors, although they are perhaps the biggest example of what it means to be a regular season team. They find success with Lowry and DeRozan because Masai Ujiri has unearthed complimentary talent on limited resources. Having 11 capable rotation players, a top-notch medical staff, and two players who can function (yet not necessarily thrive) as star players, will get you a playoff appearance and home-court advantage. You can add up enough marginal advantages over the course of 82 games to win 50 games if you’re not perpetually incompetent like the Wizards.

Being competent is not insignificant, especially not for this franchise. It wasn’t that long ago when Bryan Colangelo gave Andrea Bargnani the same deal as Curry. Reviving the popularity of basketball in Toronto is an incredible accomplishment that fans should always thank DeRozan, Lowry, and Casey for. They have done a great thing to raise expectations and give us hope, even if that hope ultimately buries them.

But if the goal is to win under the toughest of tests from champions in the postseason, then you cannot succeed with compromises. That’s the brutally honest lesson of the past five playoff failures: DeRozan and Lowry aren’t enough.