Since neither primary is actually relevant to the ultimate outcome...”
Um, ok.
We’ll see if your assertion is true in a couple of weeks.
Just going by past history. The winner of the Iowa Caucus has won the nomination a little over half the time, several of those being the incumbent. As far as NH is concerned, some of last few winners of the primary have been John McCain and Pat Buchanan, or someone else, NOT the eventual nominee. Even the Democrats don’t always choose the eventual nominee in their NY primary, considering Gary Hart won it in the year he ran. Seems pretty clear to me that neither IA or NH is indicative of the majority of other Republican voters these days.