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Every team in professional sports has a story to tell, its own narrative that it uses to build trust with its fans.

And while each is unique, they all essentially follow the same script:

“Here’s where we are, here’s where we’re going, here’s how we’re going to get there. Now come along for the ride.”

Telling that story has become an essential part of successfully marketing any team because it helps fans stay on board when the journey is inevitably interrupted by the occasional dip along the way.

The Toronto Maple Leafs perfected this art during their tear-down two seasons ago, the subsequent announcement that there would be “pain” and the management of expectations that followed.

But eventually every team gets to one of two places: Either it reaches the Promised Land by winning a championship or it hits that point where the narrative goes off script and the fans stop believing what they’ve been sold.

That’s exactly where the Toronto Raptors find themselves following their four-game sweep at the hands of the Cleveland Cavaliers that wrapped up Sunday afternoon.

Four years ago, when the Raptors unexpectedly reached the playoffs for the first time in six seasons in an eventual seven-game first-round loss to the Brooklyn Nets, they had an appealing story to tell.

Back then, the Raptors promoted themselves as an organization that would no longer be pushed around (“F*** Brooklyn”), would no longer be the NBA’s forgotten franchise (“We The North!”) and with a trio of young stars in DeMar DeRozan, Kyle Lowry and Jonas Valanciunas, were ready to climb their way to the very top of the NBA and eventually win a championship.

When they fell in four games to Washington during the first round in the spring of 2015, few were questioning the overall direction of things, despite the disappointment.  This year’s loss to the Cavaliers, however, is different.

In losing to Cleveland in six games during the Eastern Conference final one year ago, the Raptors got a clear sense of where they stood in comparison to LeBron James and company. So this season was always going to be about, at the very least, trying to close that gap.

But after having a year to study and come up with a plan for the Cavaliers – one that included adding two key pieces in Serge Ibaka and P.J. Tucker at this year’s NBA trade deadline – it turns out that the gap between the Cavaliers and the Raptors has actually widened.

Sure the Raptors were without Kyle Lowry in Games 3 and 4, but they were closer to the Cavs in both games without Lowry than they were with him during the first two games of the series.

With Lowry turning 32 before next year’s playoffs and eligible for free agency and a hefty pay raise this summer, it’s not as simple as saying we’ll get ‘em next year.

Are Ibaka and Tucker worth bringing back, since they were supposed to be a big part of the solution against Cleveland?  Can anyone imagine Patrick Patterson or DeMarre Carroll as part of a championship squad?

The Raptors, as currently constructed, are no longer a young and upcoming team. Their style of play is out of sync with the direction the NBA is heading and there is ample evidence that they could be chasing more than just the Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference very soon.

So what exactly is the story the Raptors sell to their fans going into this off-season? That’s a heck of a question, because bringing back the band for another round simply isn’t going to do it.

DeRozan’s comment that the Raptors would have beaten Cleveland had LeBron James been on their team may seem like a player simply speaking the obvious truth. But it’s also speaks to the lack of belief among one of Toronto’s star players. And when one of your two best players openly expresses a hopeless view of facing the Cavaliers and the other (Lowry) displays body language that seems to echo DeRozan’s words, what exactly is the message to the fans?

It’s that once again Toronto is getting sand kicked in its face, (think of LeBron grabbing that beer, or spinning the ball on his finger before taking that three) which is exactly the kind of thing team president Masai Ujiri was trying to do away with when he arrived four years ago.

These past four seasons represent the most successful period in Raptors history.

There have been a lot of great nights at the ACC, including the thrilling playoff drama of a team getting to places it had never previously been.

But Toronto needs a new story to tell.

And you simply can’t do that without changing at least some of the main characters.