Is the situation really this bad?

[neverminder]

Seems like the New Year has got things picking up. I've been pinged by recruiters several times already since the start of the year about Sales Engineering positions at pre-IPO tech companies in my space (cloud data platfom / engineering).

I don't know about that. A couple of recruiters called me to "check how the job search is going" and when I told them I just landed a role, they basically started begging me for passing the leads of other roles I may have been interviewing with at the time. These guys are still desperate and they are like vultures - won't leave a bone unpicked.