On Saturday, the 54th Bundesliga season came to an end with Bayern Munich winning their 26th Bundesliga title and fifth in a row. In other news, the sky is blue, the sun came up in the morning, and it will go down in the afternoon.

These days it’s a foregone conclusion that Bayern Munich will win the Bundesliga pretty much every year. Not only do they have the best and deepest team in the league, but they also have the most resources to ensure that the status quo in Germany stays that way. What’s actually impressive is that despite knowing that Bayern will win pretty much every season, the Bundesliga itself manages to annually put out a very entertaining product that is arguably the most fun league to watch in Europe.

Winning five consecutive league titles is no simple feat (though Juventus have currently won six straight titles in Italy) and Bayern should be proud of this accomplishment. However, at the end of the day, the fifth straight title was just one trophy this season, and Bayern didn’t win anything else this year. With the current landscape of the Bundesliga the way it is, can you call this a successful season for Bayern Munich?

You can’t.

I’m not a Bayern Munich fan, so I went to The Comeback‘s resident Bayern fan Harrison Prolic and asked him if he deemed this a successful season for Bayern. Here is how he answered that question.

“Bayern dipped a bit this season. Even though I think the league is still a great accomplishment, especially five in a row. But they put their eggs in the CL basket, so you kind of have to grade their season on a curve.”

Harrison is right. You have to grade Bayern Munich on a curve. But that’s not because they put all their eggs into the Champions League this season but rather it’s because they aren’t really challenged in the Bundesliga.

In the five years that Bayern have won consecutive titles, their lowest margin of victory has been 10 points in the table. Three times they wrapped up the league in mid-April. In other words, most years Bayern doesn’t even get pushed into a title race, it’s over before it begins. RB Leipzig may have given them a surprise in the first half of this season but it was unrealistic to think they would keep up their pace over the full campaign.

Bayern have kept this stranglehold of the league because off the field, they’re competing at a different level from everyone else. Bayern are the only team in Germany that can sign players from Real Madrid (Bayer Leverkusen signed Manchester United castaway Javier Chicharito Hernandez, though that same summer Manchester United were signing a Bayern castaway in Bastian Schweinsteiger), while also signing top teenage prospects, and of course, nearly any young player that shows any promise in the Bundesliga.

Bayern’s five year run started when they poached Mario Mandzukic from Bundesliga rival Wolfsburg. A year later, they took their biggest rival’s, Borussia Dortmund, most promising player Mario Gotze and added their most dangerous player Robert Lewandowski a year later. Prior to the 2015/16 season, they snatched up Stuttgart’s top prospect Joshua Kimmich, and then went shopping around Europe to land Arturo Vidal, Kinglsey Coman, and Douglass Costa. Prior to this season, Bayern dipped back into the Dortmund well to sign Mats Hummels, the team’s best defender, and then went out and signed Renato Sanches who went on to win Young Player of the Tournament at Euro 2016. They didn’t stopped there. For next season, Bayern have already signed away Hoffenheim pair Sebastian Ruddy and Nicklas Sue. It’s a case of the rich constantly getting richer.

That’s what makes the stakes so high for Bayern. Every team gives off the appearance that they can challenge Bayern, the Bavarians poach their players. That’s why they have to graded on a curve.

Bayern’s team is so deep that their fringe players would walk in to the starting XI of almost every other team in the Bundesliga. If they played exclusively with their fringe players they would still likely win the Bundesliga. Therefore it’s almost inexcusable for them to not be competing for any other trophies this season.

Bayern brought themselves into this problem on their own. It can easily be argued that new manager Carlo Ancelotti did a horrible job of rotating the squad. Young stars Joshua Kimmich and Renato Sanches didn’t play nearly as often as they should have. Thomas Muller was impotent most of the season and could have used a wake up call.

Instead he stuck with his first choice guys week in week out and ended up crashing out of the Champions League in the quarterfinals and the DFB Pokal in the semifinals. The Champions League was an interesting case as it featured some very questionable refereeing decisions but tired legs certainly played a factor in Bayern losing to Dortmund at home, after having beaten them 4-1 just weeks earlier.

Not every team has a successful season every year, and every club has different standards for success. Most clubs would be thrilled to win their league title but for Bayern that’s become something they can do simply by going through the motions.

Until the rest of the Bundesliga catches up to Bayern, the league can’t be their measuring stick. The Bavarian giants will be judged on what other trophies they’ve won in addition to their ever-growing list of Bundesliga titles, and this season they didn’t win any.

About Pauly Kwestel

Pauly is a Producer for WFAN in New York and the CBS Sports Radio Network. He has been writing about the beautiful game since 2010 and can be followed on twitter @pkwestelWFAN