Realistically, how much better could Biden/Trump have done

[Pericles]

Even with the stable polling, Biden's lead shrunk by about 2 points from its peak when Trump caught Covid. However a lot of people voted around that time so it's not as simple as having Trump get hospitalized right before the election. Maybe if he gets hit by a really bad news cycle later in October, the undecideds could have been better for Biden and NC would have flipped. And a better Biden campaign probably could have flipped NC but TX and FL were very tough. Trump's approval rating was also very stable and turns out to have been higher than expected, plus Biden increased his favorability through the general election to positive territory, so it's hard to see him doing much better. Which is depressing since Trump came within 0.6% of re-election.

I suppose a 6% PV win with Biden +2% in the tipping point state would have been a pretty good result, if that translates into the exact same swing down-ballot that's at most 230 House seats, 51 Senate seats, and with redistricting the only changes are that Democrats get a trifecta in MN and Republicans probably don't get one in NH. Even if NC Senate had flipped though, the Senate would still have been decided by GA runoffs and so in the days after the election Republicans would still probably be seen as the favorites to hold the Senate. So it's hard to get a result that has feels like a blue wave at the time.