That’s funny — I actually remember 2014 feeling like a "very uncertain" midterm election to many as well. At this point in 2014, the consensus was that (a) Democrats still had a very good chance of holding the Senate (with much discussion about how Republicans like Tom Cotton of AR were "blowing" their races*), (b) there was no way Republicans were going to gain governorships (with a "banner year" for Democrats considered a more likely outcome than a GOP wave in the gubernatorial races), and (c) the GCB average was actually very close/basically a tie.
*e.g. https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/07/08/the-gop-is-worried-cotton-falls-flat-on-campaign-trail
I think most people acknowledged Arkansas as a likely flip that year before end of summer. It was pretty obvious at the time he and Landrieu were DOA.
What makes this year tricky is that if the Dem incumbents do as well as Mark Pryor did relative to Obama 2012, they win.
Well, the point is that it
wasn’t obvious to most observers/pundits even in August 2014. It was also a fairly late-breaking GOP year in general, which could (emphasis on "could") be true for this cycle as well.
I certainly agree with your second point, but I think Tillis 2014 might be a better analogy than Cotton 2014 (flawed swing state Republican buoyed by the environment/Obama disapproval rather than any notable strengths of his own). The only problem with this is the number of swing states Democrats have to defend this year — assuming Republicans hold WI/NC/OH (they might as well disband if they don’t) and Democrats hold NH/CO (they might as well disband if they don’t), Democrats need a similar underperformance in
three of AZ, NV, GA, and PA to win the majority. Doable, but not particularly easy. I’d also argue that Laxalt and even Masters are stronger candidates than Tillis was in 2014.
Worth noting, however, that Republicans actually had some room for error in 2014 and many paths to 51. This year, they really can’t afford to lose much else after PA.
If I had to pick two Senate races which will decide it, I’d say AZ and NV.
