2 or 3 reasons Cruz is polling 4th or 5th (which is not the bottomof 15 or 17).
1) Maybe he, like Rubio, has a strategy to not peak to early...to avoid the Scott Walker strategy mistake.
2) Cruz talks in negatives, not positives. He plays the victim card. He plays defense. The victim card rarely works for conservatives (or any R). Negativity rarely works.
3) Cruz staff/leaders seem to be amateurs. Have they never run a competitive campaign before? The devil is in the details in the running of a campaign. Those details should be handled by the staff, not the candidate. Why are those details so often overlooked?
4) Despite headlines, 60% of R primary voters currently poll UNDECIDED, the candidate the media never covers.
Your number one is correct---Cruz plays the long game---but everything else is wrong.
"2) Cruz talks in negatives, not positives. He plays the victim card. He plays defense. The victim card rarely works for conservatives (or any R). Negativity rarely works."
Which is why Cruz Does NOT go negative and instead focuses on policy, solutions, and the Constitution. He has a long-tested strategy of doing so, and frankly I don't even know what you're talking about.
Cruz playing the victim? You're not thinking of Ted. You have him confused with another candidate.
"3) Cruz staff/leaders seem to be amateurs. Have they never run a competitive campaign before? The devil is in the details in the running of a campaign. Those details should be handled by the staff, not the candidate. Why are those details so often overlooked?"
Everything you say here is the polar opposite of reality.
Cruz runs what he calls a modern, grassroots, guerrilla campaign. He did it successfully to win the Texas Senate race, and he's doing it now.
In the Senate race, Ted, who had no name recognition and was polling at -1, according to one estimate, ended up beating an extremely popular, wealthy, self-funded opponent. And he won handily.
Ted doesn't think much of candidates who let their staff/advisors tell them every move to make, even to the exclusion of what they know is right. He has good instincts and prefers to go along with them. He's been laying his ground game in every state since he announced. He's meticulous; no details are being overlooked.