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2023 RB Apocalypse to Come? (1 Viewer)

This guy's stuff has been shared recently on Twitter and on this forum but this tweeted chart shows a really strong window into what the landscape may be looking like very soon. And none of it incorporates injuries which are sure to come. 

Thoughts?


Very nice layout of all the RB situations in one place. thanks for sharing.

as a Khalil Herbert owner in 3 of my 3 dynasty leagues, I’m surprised to not see him listed in the chart, unless I missed him in there. He should be in the Rookie Contract column, right?

 
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I get the gist of what he's getting at but must say  I'm not a  big fan of the work. Had good amount of disagreement on what he considered likely or unlikely cuts and not sure how he could exclude a guy like Penny from pending FA while listing what will be a 30 year old Gordon.

 
Very nice layout of all the RB situations in one place. thanks for sharing.

as a Khalil Herbert owner in 3 of my 3 dynasty leagues, I’m surprised to not see him listed in the chart, unless I missed him in there. He should be in the Rookie Contract column, right?
He was a 6th rounder from a different regime but I feel the same. Especially with Monty set to be a FA. I am sure the new coaches will be happy to give him reps, who else they got?

I get the gist of what he's getting at but must say  I'm not a  big fan of the work. Had good amount of disagreement on what he considered likely or unlikely cuts and not sure how he could exclude a guy like Penny from pending FA while listing what will be a 30 year old Gordon.
Yeah I mean I just like the approach to it. 

There's a weird cutoff with round 4 draft. That may be some of why it's hard to follow.
Yes I think he is cutting them off at RD 4 draft capital, which I would strongly disagree with. But it is also a reasonable place to start. I would probably slice it there and then situation by situation try to refine it. I always keep a depth chart in my sheets anyway, but I'm admittedly typically late in following who is in a contract year, etc.

 
There isn't a faster way to make me tune out on someone in 2022 than when they break RB conversation into "starters" and "non-starters".    For the most part, bellcow RBs are becoming a thing of the past.  If you have one that has the talent and actually plays for a team that still embraces it, well that's worth its weight in gold and what an automatic top 5 pick looks like in a fantasy draft.

Other than the very few bellcow situations, it's at least a 2-man show, if not a third satellite RB that has an established role, if not a full blown 3 or 4-man cluster of humanity.   And I get that many of the 2-man shows might skew more towards 70-30 or 65-35, rather than 50-50, but it's all on a gradient with at least 2 RBs of some significance in most fantasy leagues.

 
And I get that many of the 2-man shows might skew more towards 70-30
This is not official but I think if you just count the games they played that Najee and Dalvin are the only two RB's last year got play more then 70% of their teams snaps. It's likely that CMC, Barkley and Henry would have had they remained healthy because they all started the season with that kind of workload.

Najee led the league at 83% of his teams snaps.

So you are right on the percentages but I view the bell cow term on  sliding scale as to say if you are 65% snap count guy in today's NFL I'm calling you a bell cow.  60% and you are clear cut starter so I don't have any issue with the terminology and the first round of drafts are going to be filled with RB's I anticipate being in that 60-70% zone. That's the new bell cow zone for me.

 
menobrown said:
This is not official but I think if you just count the games they played that Najee and Dalvin are the only two RB's last year got play more then 70% of their teams snaps. It's likely that CMC, Barkley and Henry would have had they remained healthy because they all started the season with that kind of workload.

Najee led the league at 83% of his teams snaps.

So you are right on the percentages but I view the bell cow term on  sliding scale as to say if you are 65% snap count guy in today's NFL I'm calling you a bell cow.  60% and you are clear cut starter so I don't have any issue with the terminology and the first round of drafts are going to be filled with RB's I anticipate being in that 60-70% zone. That's the new bell cow zone for me.


I guess it's all semantics, and thanks for the very helpful hard numbers.   I should qualify that further, since there's certainly nothing wrong with calling any of these guys starters.   Perfectly fine to identify a "starting RB" in a more a narrow / general discussion.  But my point is that it doesn't make much sense in today's NFL for the analyst to paint the picture of a RB landscape with 32 starting jobs.   Guess what, there's a batch of hungry young RBs coming in for 2023, so look out cuz your starting RB might be out on his ###!!  

The general point is fine.   The RB workloads will continue to trend more and more towards disposable committee members, if we're not to the absolute end of that spectrum already.   2023 is a healthy crop.   If you're sitting on Josh Jacobs and think no sweat if he moves on, maybe he'll get an 83-17 Najee-like workload on his next squad, you're probably going to be really disappointed.    If you think AJ Dillon will be a 75+ guy once A. Jones moves on, you're probably going to be disappointed.   A formidable #2 will probably make his way to town, limiting it to a 60-40 or 65-35 at best.   However, presenting the landscape as anything close to  a game of musical chairs with only 32 seats is not the way to look at it in my opinion.

For me "bellcow" will always be Najee last year, Lev Bell on the Steelers, Emmitt Smith, etc.   Rather than letting the 60/65% guys become the new standard for that title, I would rather continue to identify those guys as "feature backs" and just call a spade a spade and say that the "bellcow RBs" are endangered species that could one day be on the verge of extinction.    But that's just what those phrases mean to me.   Nobody appointed me Word Police. :)

 
So the way I look at it, these are the guys that are bellcows or feature backs well above a 50-50 split.  If I have them now, I'm certainly hoping that they're still a feature back+ in 2023, though a few of them have some risk of falling back to something closer to a 50-50.  A couple of the younger guys are a projection into this kind of role:

  • 15: Najee, Jon Taylor, Henry, Dalv Cook, Kamara, CMC, Mixon, Zeke, Swift, Jav Williams, Hall, Ekeler, Chubb, A Jones, Barkley 
These are the guys that I'm hoping to be more than a 50-50.  I like their chances, but some of them won't get there:

  • 10: Montgomery, Dobbins, Etienne, Josh Jacobs, K. Walker, Akers, Ant Gibson, AJ Dillon, James Cook, James Robinson
I'm less bullish on any of these being significantly more than a 50-50 in 2023.  Some might be the "better" part of a 55-45 split backfield, many will be the "lesser" part of a split, or purely backup:

  • 21: Sanders, Pollard, CEH, Elijah Mitchell, Stevenson, Damien Harris, Hunt, Cord Patterson, Rachaad White, Conner, Fournette, Pierce, Zamir White, Penny, Ronald Jones, Davis-Price, Herbert, Spiller, Melvin Gordon, Edmonds, Mostert
Potential for significant contributions in a backup role, extremely unlikely to be any team's top back.  Some will bust or fade out of the NFL RB picture completely.   I'm skipping some of the later round rookies that could definitely get here, but the odds probably aren't in their favor

  • 13:  Michel, Singletary, Darrel Williams, Gus Edwards, Jamaal Williams, D. Henderson, Mattison, M. Carter, Hines, Brian Robinson Jr, Gainwell, Sermon, Strong


From the first two groups of 15 & 10, you probably have 21 feature backs(+) in 2023 at the most.   At least four will regress with age, or injury takes them off the RB landscape entirely, or (hopefully) they mix in with the group of 21 and become part of a shared backfield in 2023.

So that takes us down to 11 starter ("top" RB spots).   Bijan, Gibbs, Tucker, Evans are likely candidates to claim 3-4 feature roles.   Guys like Bigsby, Milton, Achane, Corum and a host of others are certainly in the mix, but are probably more likely to start out part of a 1-2 punch.   Smaller guys like Vaughn almost certainly the #2 in a 1-2 punch.

So that should leave at least 5 to 7 "top" RB spots on NFL rosters.  This will be filled out by anyone that steps up from the group of 21, but I suspect most will be filled as a 2 or 3-man committee.  

 
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I guess it's all semantics, and thanks for the very helpful hard numbers.   I should qualify that further, since there's certainly nothing wrong with calling any of these guys starters.   Perfectly fine to identify a "starting RB" in a more a narrow / general discussion.  But my point is that it doesn't make much sense in today's NFL for the analyst to paint the picture of a RB landscape with 32 starting jobs.   Guess what, there's a batch of hungry young RBs coming in for 2023, so look out cuz your starting RB might be out on his ###!!  

The general point is fine.   The RB workloads will continue to trend more and more towards disposable committee members, if we're not to the absolute end of that spectrum already.   2023 is a healthy crop.   If you're sitting on Josh Jacobs and think no sweat if he moves on, maybe he'll get an 83-17 Najee-like workload on his next squad, you're probably going to be really disappointed.    If you think AJ Dillon will be a 75+ guy once A. Jones moves on, you're probably going to be disappointed.   A formidable #2 will probably make his way to town, limiting it to a 60-40 or 65-35 at best.   However, presenting the landscape as anything close to  a game of musical chairs with only 32 seats is not the way to look at it in my opinion.

For me "bellcow" will always be Najee last year, Lev Bell on the Steelers, Emmitt Smith, etc.   Rather than letting the 60/65% guys become the new standard for that title, I would rather continue to identify those guys as "feature backs" and just call a spade a spade and say that the "bellcow RBs" are endangered species that could one day be on the verge of extinction.    But that's just what those phrases mean to me.   Nobody appointed me Word Police. :)
Don't think this is directed at you so much, @sushinsky4tsar, I'm just choosing this spot to jump in again but FWIW in the tweet thread OP above the guy that came up with this *did* have a few backfields as shared. It wasn't an even 32 team starter split. I fully agree with 99% of what you're saying re:what is or isn't a bellcow and how teams employ their backs. For me when I do a *very* similar exercise I build out all the depth charts by where I think the backs will finish in FF, regardless of whether I think they are a bellcow, or more of a complimentary piece, or what have you. I suspect this guy is more or less just doing the same and all he is really trying to accomplish is try and show the possible landscape and you have to put splits somewhere. "Starter" is certainly imperfect but it accomplishes what he is trying to do, IMO. Nobody is trying to win a grant with this stuff. I think we can easily nitpick and criticize some of the actual names and such but this exercise is the very first thing I do after the Super Bowl. 

Also, the main point this guy was making, which I could be wrong but it seems like everyone has completely missed, is that there isn't going to be enough chairs for all the RBs. There simply aren't that many jobs to fill. But, inevitably we know injuries change that, and we know RBs on rookie contracts are going to be favored (isn't this becoming or has already became the consensus take?) over FA vets (big assumption). As a result, a bumper crop of rookies in 2023 really could blow things up. Turnover outpaces expectations every. freakin. year. 

I don't think the take home message is to sell vets per se. For me it is just hey this is what we're looking at (or something approximating it).

 
Yeah, I think the message is that if you're hoping for a bigger role in the future for your RB assets, it's not impossible, but you're swimming upstream.   It's more likely that some of your reliable RBs that aren't ascending talents might actually see their roles scaled back a bit.

But yes, the RB churn is more than capable of opening up some spots, unfortunately.  It will happen at he NFL and NCAA level.

I don't think it's supposed to be a large talent pool of 2023 WRs.   It's a good thing, because that's actually the position where I feel like we're running out of WR1 and WR2 spots, especially considering that they tend to stick around longer. 

 
These are the guys that I'm hoping to be more than a 50-50.  I like their chances, but some of them won't get there:

  • 10: Montgomery, Dobbins, Etienne, Josh Jacobs, K. Walker, Akers, Ant Gibson, AJ Dillon, James Cook, James Robinson
Not to pick nits in what was a very thoughtful post that I enjoyed, but wouldn’t it be literally impossible for both ETN & Robinson to have more than 50-50 since they play on the same team? 

Just something that jumped out at me. 

 
Not to pick nits in what was a very thoughtful post that I enjoyed, but wouldn’t it be literally impossible for both ETN & Robinson to have more than 50-50 since they play on the same team? 

Just something that jumped out at me. 


I'll level with you, didn't have the heart to bump Robinson down, but probably should have.   I originally had Sanders on this tier and bumped him down, JR probably should have joined him.

However, this is why I'm saying 21 feature backs at best from the first two groups of 25.   J-Rob is a favorite to be one of the four.   I hate to say it, but Akers might be too.   I'm not convinced that NFL RBs just get over Achilles injuries now.  Sadly, there will probably be more than four that flunk out of my first two tiers of 25, at least to a point where they're no longer resembling a feature back role in 2023.

 
I don't think it's supposed to be a large talent pool of 2023 WRs.   It's a good thing, because that's actually the position where I feel like we're running out of WR1 and WR2 spots, especially considering that they tend to stick around longer. 
i have a good 12-15 guys who could well be contributing NFL receivers with an elite 2-3 at the top. It’s a pretty decent class. 

As for the OP, I could see some of the RBBC teams opt to take a stud in 2023. Miami comes to mind first and foremost, and I’m wondering if they’ll be the team to take Bijan Robinson (assuming he’s unscathed in 2022)

Many are projecting the Texans to take an early RB, whether it’s Gibbs or one of the other guys.

There are about 7 really solid backs coming out in 2023. As mentioned, there are injuries every season - MIA, HOU & ATL could all use a quality RB.

It’ll be fascinating to see who lands where. 2023 may well be a year that landing spot > pure talent.  Landing spot it always important, but with so many talented backs likely coming out, opportunity is going to be a huge factor in who’s worth what. 

 
I'll level with you, didn't have the heart to bump Robinson down, but probably should have.   I originally had Sanders on this tier and bumped him down, JR probably should have joined him.
fair. 

However, this is why I'm saying 21 feature backs at best from the first two groups of 25.   J-Rob is a favorite to be one of the four.   I hate to say it, but Akers might be too.   I'm not convinced that NFL RBs just get over Achilles injuries now.  Sadly, there will probably be more than four that flunk out of my first two tiers of 25, at least to a point where they're no longer resembling a feature back role in 2023.
Yeah, when considering which teams needed a RB, the Rams actually came to mind. This year will likely be a make or break for Akers. 

 
I appreciate him splitting it all out but I'm not sure I get his point.

Assuming his cut candidates, he has 16 starting RB jobs open heading into 2023.

That seems like PLENTY for the number of guys available.  Maybe people are more optimistic about some of these lessor/older RBs than me but I wasn't really expecting guys like Melvin Gordon, Devin Singletary, Gus Edwards, etc to land a starting role somewhere.

Saquon, Kamara, Ekeler, Cook should land somewhere that they get a nice chunk of volume.  Nearly 30 year old Henry maybe.  Zeke maybe.  Other than that with a bunch of good rookies coming in, that leaves a few spots left for allllllll those meh RBs to fight over, which is how a typical offseason goes.  A random one or two of them lands a sweet landing spot (a la Jerrick McKinnon) that boosts their value, and the rest mostly fade away.

 
i have a good 12-15 guys who could well be contributing NFL receivers with an elite 2-3 at the top. It’s a pretty decent class. 


I think there are probably 2 to 4 that are at least good enough to command a starting WR1 or WR2 spot on an NFL offense right out of the gate.  Maybe a name or two ascends to that level, but the rest are probably good prospects that could climb a depth chart  (and nothing says you can't be fantasy relevant as the right NFL team's WR3 in 2022).   I'm not at a Chase or Jefferson level of elite for JSN, Addison (size), or Boutee (mystery injury) yet.   In fairness, I don't think many were there on Jefferson when he came out.

It’ll be fascinating to see who lands where. 2023 may well be a year that landing spot > pure talent.  Landing spot it always important, but with so many talented backs likely coming out, opportunity is going to be a huge factor in who’s worth what. 


One of the things that I've learned in recent years of watching the draft; the teams that seem like they have the available bandwidth to draft one of the top RB prospects never seem to pull the trigger.   See Houston and Atlanta the last couple of years or Miami in 2021.  But yes, it would be great if you had the 1.1 and Miami finally decided to clear the room for a bellcow.

In reality, it seems just as likely that Carroll drafts Bijan and adds him to his collection of Walker, while also replacing Penny with Miles Sanders in free agency.

 
Also, the main point this guy was making, which I could be wrong but it seems like everyone has completely missed, is that there isn't going to be enough chairs for all the RBs
My initial response was that I got the gist of what he was trying to say  meaning I got his point on the more RB's then open spaces. I've actually felt that way for a few years now. Understand depth of 2023 draft will make it more of an issue this year, but at same time most of the 2017 RB class plus Elliot will be 28 in 2023. Next two years we should see a pretty significant changing of the guard at RB with a lot coming and a lot exiting center stage.

In any year I would say a lot of RB situations in the league can be drastically altered in FA or during the draft and it's why it's not a great idea to invest in RB's before FA or the draft you don't feel absolutely are secure in their role. Next year just has a little higher odds of that happening then we've seen in last few.

 
Yeah, I think the message is that if you're hoping for a bigger role in the future for your RB assets, it's not impossible, but you're swimming upstream. 
Agree 100%, which is why or dynasty purposes, I'm going to try to avoid investing too heavily in the Allegiers and Pierces of the world - that is, later round rookies that seem to have a path to being starters for their teams this year, but unless they really hit, they could easily be pushed aside next year. 

Also makes be a bit concerned about the dynasty prospects of Pollard and Mattison, probably the two best backups in the league that are also UFAs after this year. With the talent coming out and several current starters entering free agency themselves, there may not be an easy path to be a starter somewhere (either on their own teams or elsewhere).

 
This is far from groundbreaking, but still a nice visual.  

The truth is: we evaluate age with 27 being a point of interest.  In addition, we evaluate talent, draft capital and situation.  Just looking at 2 years ago with ETN and Najee Harris - people were generally split on the talent, Etienne is 23 and Harris is 24 but the situation was ripe for the picking.  Najee was drafted into a bellcow situation and I assume pushed him to the top of draft the RB crop in fantasy.

If you aren't already looking at shipping guys like Fournette, Zeke, CMC for something in return, you are probably content with them dying on your roster.  I continually look to get younger and find situational upside.  That's why I look at places like, regardless of whether guys are on the roster:

Buccaneers: Rachad White (worthy of grabbing any RB they take late in 2023? yup!)

Titans: Hassan Haskins (I'd take Haskins late, but I'd bet on the next guy they draft too)

Bengals: Mixon will be 26 in a month (I'd spend a 2nd/3rd on that situation if it came to fruition).

Raidiers: Zamir White?  (I think I would be willing to buy him, but would also buy another RB drafted by the Raiders).

Chiefs: I don't know if CEH or RoJo are the answer and I'll be watching what they do next year.

I'll be monitoring the following vacated backfields in 2023 pretty heavily: Arizona, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas (high probability Zeke isn't on the team in 2023) all seem like pretty good destinations for anyone.  I think you draft Bijan, regardless of the landing spot but it is a good way to break up the Gibbs, Tucker, Bigsby, Evans tier and could potentially push guys in that 3rd tier over a Bigsby (if he lands in an undesirable location).

The situation is just too fluid to have any definitive outlook on it like the spreadsheet shows. 

 
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menobrown said:
I get the gist of what he's getting at but must say I'm not a  big fan of the work. Had good amount of disagreement on what he considered likely or unlikely cuts and not sure how he could exclude a guy like Penny from pending FA while listing what will be a 30 year old Gordon.
Would agree, I don't see any of Henry, Dalvin, or Ekeler being likely cut candidates unless they suddenly and completely breakdown. I know some definitely disagree but I don't see Zeke as a likely cut candidate as I expect a good chance for him to bounce back if healthy this year and Pollard is a FA. I don't think it's likely Monty or Barkley end up walking in FA either as both CHI & NYG are top 5 in cap space.

The cap keeps going up and it's easy to extend/restructure these RB's for cheaper and cheaper with the devaluing of the position by nearly all teams. Yeah, someone may decide to try for big FA $, but I think most likely you are looking at Josh Jacobs as the only marquee FA RB on the market next year (and that assumes the Raiders don't resign him which is not 100% a given.) After that I wouldn't be too excited about guys like 28 year old Hunt, Sanders, Henderson, Pollard or JRob coming off an Achilles as a FA RB class.

 
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Would agree, I don't see any of Henry, Dalvin, or Ekeler being likely cut candidates unless they suddenly and completely breakdown. I know some definitely disagree but I don't see Zeke as a likely cut candidate as I expect a good chance for him to bounce back if healthy this year and Pollard is a FA. I don't think it's likely Monty or Barkley end up walking in FA either as both CHI & NYG are top 5 in cap space.

The cap keeps going up and it's easy to extend/restructure these RB's for cheaper and cheaper with the devaluing of the position by nearly all teams. Yeah, someone may decide to try for big FA $, but I think most likely you are looking at Josh Jacobs as the only marquee FA RB on the market next year (and that assumes the Raiders don't resign him which is not 100% a given.) After that I wouldn't be too excited about guys like 28 year old Hunt, Sanders, Henderson, Pollard or JRob coming off an Achilles as a FA RB class.
While I agree with this in general and I think the sensationalism of the OP is just that,, as far as Cook goes I think the Vikings need to find a lot of money to re-sign Jefferson and it's possible that Cook might be let go as a way to facilitate that.

If he has a great season this year maybe not but him being retained is not a given. The new GM might be looking to save money there.

It's undecided right now. I am expecting them to give Cook every opportunity to prove he is worth the money this year.

As far as Mattison I think FF values him more than the NFL will and he will be on a new team regardless of what they decide to do with Cook.

 
This guy's stuff has been shared recently on Twitter and on this forum but this tweeted chart shows a really strong window into what the landscape may be looking like very soon. And none of it incorporates injuries which are sure to come. 

Thoughts?
While I disagree with much in the first 5 columns, I do find the last 2 columns useful.  Lots of interesting FAs upcoming + whoever's drafted.  I appreciate the effort and get the idea.  Thanks for linking.

 
While I agree with this in general and I think the sensationalism of the OP is just that,, as far as Cook goes I think the Vikings need to find a lot of money to re-sign Jefferson and it's possible that Cook might be let go as a way to facilitate that.

If he has a great season this year maybe not but him being retained is not a given. The new GM might be looking to save money there.

It's undecided right now. I am expecting them to give Cook every opportunity to prove he is worth the money this year.

As far as Mattison I think FF values him more than the NFL will and he will be on a new team regardless of what they decide to do with Cook.
Hard to predict the future but I wouldn’t be too concerned for 2023. Cook has a high base salary that could be easily restructured. Jefferson would only be going into year 4 of 5, any big contract would probably be an extension with most of the cap hit coming in 2024 and beyond. Vikes can also free up a lot of space as they have a bunch of guys with big base salaries so either restructuring some of those or even maybe moving on from Thielen or Harrison Smith who will both be 34 by then.

 
Buckna said:
Hard to predict the future but I wouldn’t be too concerned for 2023. Cook has a high base salary that could be easily restructured. Jefferson would only be going into year 4 of 5, any big contract would probably be an extension with most of the cap hit coming in 2024 and beyond. Vikes can also free up a lot of space as they have a bunch of guys with big base salaries so either restructuring some of those or even maybe moving on from Thielen or Harrison Smith who will both be 34 by then.
You could be right. I think it's yet to be determined. A lot of these decisions will be made based on how the players perform for the new coaches this season.

They do seem to be able to find the money if they want to, even when they shouldn't.

The drafting of Lewis Cine certainly points to them being prepared to move on without Smith who is getting old.

I think a lot of this depends on how well Cook plays. He did change to number 4 his college number and he seems very motivated. Maybe a big year for him this season and if he accomplishes that then surely they keep him. That said if he misses a lot of games I can see them moving in another direction.

The new coaches seem to intend to throw the ball more so having a elite RB seems like less of a priority compared to the last regime.

 
I think the take away is don't value rb for situation. There's a few 3rd-4th round rookie guys sought after because they landed in Houston or Atlanta. Chances pretty good in 2024 they're in the same situation as them ones drafted by San Fran or Washington.

Trade your 2nds for 3rds in your rookie draft. 

 
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I think the take away is don't value rb for situation. There's a few 3rd-4th round rookie guys sought after because they landed in Houston or Atlanta. Chances pretty good in 2024 they're in the same situation as them ones drafted by San Fran or Washington.

Trade your 2nds for 3rds in your rookie draft. 
Yep - this is what drove my RB decision making last month. I'll be mildly surprised if any one mid round rookie becomes a viable weekly starter year one and I'd be even more surprised if they have a 1a role or better this time next year. Will a nonzero number of them break that mold? Probably, but among the options available I'm not prioritizing one over the other because I think the NFL got it wrong, but rather just taking whatever is left at the end of the draft and using my priority draft assets elsewhere. If anyone's assessment varies and they are confident in the player they're prioritizing then go get them, but do it for their talent; not 2022 situation.

 

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