Were they an afterthought in the gen 8 development plans?

It seems really weird to me that a franchise that has occassional gap years decided to release Legends Arceus in Spring 2022 when titles were already slated for Holiday '22 and '23.

I'd just write it off as a covid thing but the timing doesn't work--there's no way BDSP could have been a 2020 title unless they started development much earlier.