Football clubs are always in transition, players join, players leave, teams develop for better or worse. Always. Don't buy it when a club official says "we are in a transitional season" to console their fans and manage expectations -- although they are technically right.
So you have to take it with a pinch of salt when you hear that Borussia Dortmund have a "defining summer" ahead.
If you ask CEO Hans-Joachim Watzke about his desired definition for Borussia Dortmund you will hear him talk about the club as the "second lighthouse" in Germany -- the second undisputed force in the Bundesliga behind Bayern Munich. Looking at the final standings and Dortmund have very much achieved that.
Indeed, a gap of 18 points between them and the 16 teams below should make the bosses rest easy. And the next logical step is to challenge Bayern for the title, right? After all the Bavarians are also a club in transition -- as everyone is -- with a managerial change at the top as Carlo Ancelotti replaces Pep Guardiola this summer.
However, for now that scenario, as much as neutral Bundesliga fans would hope for it, seems unrealistic. After last summer where Dortmund managed to keep their most prized assets and were able to improve their squad with savvy supplements like Gonzalo Castro and Julian Weigl, the Black and Yellows will have to replace two irreplaceable lynchpins of their squad.
With Mats Hummels gone to Bayern and Ilkay Gundogan likely to leave for Man City, sporting director Michael Zorc is facing another major headache.
Although Dortmund will soon lift their annual turnover over the €300 million mark, the club don't yet have the funds to purchase players in the same "world-class" category.
They can't just go and sign Barcelona's Gerard Pique, Real Madrid's Raphael Varane or Paris Saint-Germain's Thiago Silva to ease the Hummels void at the back, or fix the looming Gundogan issue with PSG's Marco Verratti.
Which means whoever BVB bring in as replacements, there will be an inevitable loss of quality. The club's build-up play will suffer the most without the creativity and technical ability of Hummels and Gundogan. Dortmund coach Thomas Tuchel could compensate to some extent by tweaking his system, but over the course of a long campaign it's impossible to make up for that kind of individual quality.
This is a fact that Henrikh Mkhitaryan is also aware of. The Armenian, who is yet to make a decision on his future at Dortmund, was voted the Bundesliga player of the season by his colleagues after scoring 11 times and bagging 20 assists in what can only be described as a stellar season.
"Why should we prolong it now?" his agent Mino Raiola recently said in Bild. "'Micki' is under contract until 2017, and we continue to think about his future."
It's safe to say, the Armenian would have already put pen to paper, had Hummels and Gundogan stayed on. But, stripped of two players that certainly made the difference for Dortmund, another "difference maker" weighs up his options.
It sounds cruel coming out of the second best domestic campaign in club history and a turnaround in Tuchel's first season that should suggest positivity is to come this year. BVB might even keep Mkhitaryan even if he won't prolong his deal because they cannot afford to lose out on another major asset with Champions League football in sight. However, that would mean losing another integral part for nothing next summer. It is a vicious cycle Borussia Dortmund somehow need to beat before it eats them up.
Otherwise, BVB are doomed to keep finding replacements for their best players at the end of every season. They've done considerably well in making up for the losses of Nuri Sahin, Shinji Kagawa, Mario Gotze and Robert Lewandowski in recent years. But the infamous seventh place finish in the Bundesliga in 2014-15 under Jurgen Klopp provided a grim example of how fickle sporting success can be and the failed transfer of Ciro Immobile for €18m in 2014 showed there is little margin for error when operating at top.
So far, Dortmund have added 19-year-old defensive midfielder Mikel Merino from Osasuna and 19-year-old Ousmane Dembele from Stade Rennes. Both are promising young talents, but neither are capable of replacing Hummels and Gundogan, nor will they convince Mkhitaryan to secure his future at Dortmund for years to come.
Marco Reus is laying the pressure on as well, because he too has high ambitions and eventually wants to lift his first trophy.
"I want this club to grow. But this won't become any easier without Mats and -- as it happens -- Ilkay, which is why I hope and expect that good new players arrive," the club icon said in WAZ. And, after his exclusion from Germany's Euro 2016 squad due to injury (which he learned on his 27th birthday), those expectations will only grow.
Dortmund have until the end of August to fulfil the hopes of their vice-captain and to persuade Mkhitaryan to stay on for good by adding good players to their squad. And, in the end, the definition of BVB's summer will very much hinge of Armenian's contract extension or lack thereof.
Persuading the Bundesliga player of the season that his future lies in Dortmund would certainly Watzke's pursuit of establishing his club as the second powerhouse in Germany a lot easier for years to come.