The thing is that from anecdotal evidence the GOP are actually very good at building a ground game, and being able to turn out voters (Both Florida, and WI spring to mind as very skilled state parties)
The problem was when groups tried to throw millions in TV advertising to prop up Strange, then Saconne.
Lol...ground game is overrated. The only reason the GOP is good at turnout is due to older voters skewing GOP and turning out at high rates in off year elections. The muh whole ground game turns voters out is a myth. People turnout when they are motivated,...no amount of commercials, canvassers, or policy papers will motivate a voter. Republican voters especially will not turnout with boogeyman Obama and Hillary not being on the ballot or in office
Yeah this lol. You can invest a million dollars in ground game and it'll only increase turnout by 3% at max.
There is no mythical dollars that makes people turn out. They either care to turn out or they don't.
At most, during a high turn out election in the middle of an economic collapse, even when accounting for population growth, economic circumstances, candidate quality, racial demographics...., ground game raised turnout for Obama by just 0.8% in 2008:
But on the flipside, John McCain's ground game actually made no difference in 2008:
So one could argue that Obama's 0.8% gain was just correlation and not causation.
With regards to 2012, Obama's ground game made almost no difference:
And let's not even talk about 2016....Trump didn't even have a ground game operation while Hillary inherited Obama's.