A fair question would be whether he and Ben Carson are getting nudged into the race the way Cain and Bachmann, etc., were put in as decoys the last time around.
That is a possibility. There were some fairly substantiated rumors in 2008 that McCain made a deal with Huckabee that allowed Huckabee to win some state. IIRC, West Virginia was involved. By doing so, it stopped Romney from getting a head of steam, thus allowing McCain a better chance at the nomination.