bill clinton was booed off the stage at the 1988 dnc and was initially widely viewed as a sacrificial lamb vs bush
Clinton made a comeback after his appearance on the Tonight show shortly after the DNC. His willingness to laugh at himself won him a lot of fans and established his persona as someone that you would like to hang out with. He won his gubernatorial race in 1990 without any difficulty.
Clinton and the other Democratic candidates may have been thought of as sacrificial lambs during much of 1991, but that changed at the beginning of 1992.
