It’s rare for a politician to be overshadowed in victory, and even rarer when that victory is actually an upset. But Ted Cruz managed that trick in Iowa: Despite pulling out a victory when almost everyone expected Donald J. Trump to win, he found himself overshadowed twice in the coverage that followed— first by Trump’s unexpected flop, and second by Marco Rubio’s unexpectedly strong third-place finish.

It was the same in the prediction markets. On Feb. 1, just before Iowa voted, Trump was given (absurdly) a 50 percent chance of winning the Republican nomination by bettors, and Rubio a 35 percent chance. No sooner had the Iowa results come in than the two men switched places — a vertiginous plunge for Trump, a leap upward for Rubio.

As for the man who actually won the caucuses? His odds ticked up — from 8 percent to 14 percent.

Why the lack of respect for Cruz? It’s true that he isn’t the first candidate to ride strong evangelical support to victory in Iowa, and the track records of Rick Santorum and Mike Huckabee don’t exactly inspire confidence. It’s true that he’s widely despised by his own party’s leadership, to a degree that some Republican machers might even prefer living dangerously with Trump to nominating Cruz. And it’s true that his record and reputation make him a significant general election gamble, in a party that hasn’t taken that kind of risk since Barry Goldwater.

But if Cruz’s weaknesses were good reasons to give him low odds when this whole process started, they aren’t good reasons anymore. In a field that’s fluid and shrinking, he may not be the absolute favorite, but his path to the nomination is as plausible as anybody else’s at this point.