Without reading the article, here's what I think the difference is in 2017 and 2020/2021
2017 bullrun was backed by retail investors due the ICO hype and the news that Japan officially acknowledge BTC as a currency might have added more fuel to the fire.
2020 ongoing bullrun wasn't even about DeFi. AFAIK, there's only a few who got sucked into this and got rug pulled compared to the ICO days because early investors learned their lessons. If DeFis were launched in 2018/2019, I bet it wouldn't even pump ethereum or other coins with smart contracts. 2020 was all about the institutional investors and yes, the pandemic also made them realize that BTC is a good store of value.
In 2021, prepare for an even bigger push both from retail and institutional investors.