Yes. The path to Dems holding the Senate is relatively narrow, but it certainly exists. Masters, Walker and Oz are all extremely flawed candidates who could definitely lose in spite of the environment.
Even Ron Johnson's favorability has massively declined since his last race. I suppose I'd still call him a narrow favorite, but him running probably makes the race harder for the GOP than it needs to be.
His favorability was not great in 2016. Like Toomey and Kirk, it was underwater. But only Kirk actually suffered the consequences, and that was in a relatively neutral year...slight R lean.
The calculus is far far better this time for RoJo, the only thing against him, is that Barnes is no Feingold.
The other three aren't necessarily all that bad, so much as the Dems actually appear good, but tbf, Kirkpatrick might actually have done better if McCain retired in 2016 and run against a Generic R. Still Kelly is pretty good and Warnock is definitely a step up from Barksdale.
I think part of what makes this tricky to analyze is what is acceptable and unacceptable, particularly for an R candidate, has changed quite a lot from 2016.
In hingsight though, I'm suprised Kirk didn't hold up better and don't understand why Duckworth overperformed downstate in the way she did.
I wouldn't be suprised if some Senate Dems run ahead of Biden by a few points in teh suburbs, but a consistent 20 point+ overperformance? How.
