‘Dancing with the Stars’ season 20 spoilers: Kym Johnson returns; Derek Hough, Cheryl Burke gone

Well, it is now even more official than it was previously: Neither Derek Hough nor Cheryl Burke will be a part of the 20th season of “Dancing with the Stars.”

If you have been following the series pretty closely the past few months, then you probably assumed already that this was most likely going to be the case. After all, just remember here that Cheryl has already said that she wanted to move on, while Derek is doing some performing in New York this season. He could theoretically return still at some point in the future.

We imagine that there were some concerns among executives after this over the lack of longtime pros. Tony Dovolani is clearly the elder statesman of the group now, even if Mark Ballas has been around at least a little while. Luckily, the show managed to secure Kym Johnson, who has been a judge as of late on the Australian version of the show. This marks her first gig on the U.S. version of the competition since season 16, and it will be nice to have her back, given that most of her partners are pretty fun.

Joining these three pros this season are Allison Holker, Emma Slater, Peta Murgatroyd, Sharna Burgess, Witney Carson (who is the reigning champ), Val Chmerkovskiy, and Artem Chigvintsev. There are two spots open for other pros, and we hope that Keo Motsepe gets another shot after going home early last fall. Also, what about bringing Val’s brother Maksim back? Is that possible? Another candidate could be Tristan MacManus, who has done work on “Strictly Come Dancing” of late but should be open in the spring.

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