History Main / AssumedWin

* The 2006 Country Music Awards saw UsefulNotes/FaithHill and UsefulNotes/CarrieUnderwood both nominated for Female Vocalist of the Year. As the nominations were being announced, a camera was trained on all five finalists, including Hill and Underwood. Then, as Underwood was announced the winner, Hill smiled and raised her arms, then apparently screamed "What?" and stormed away. All of this was [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyZRiEJnIag caught on live television]] just before the nominee camera shots were pulled away. Faith Hill and her management insisted the act was a joke, but left many unconvinced. Her career took a nosedive not long after.

* The 2006 Country Music Awards saw Faith Hill and Carrie Underwood both nominated for Female Vocalist of the Year. As the nominations were being announced, a camera was trained on all five finalists, including Hill and Underwood. Then, as Underwood was announced the winner, Hill smiled and raised her arms, then apparently screamed "What?" and stormed away. All of this was [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyZRiEJnIag caught on live television]] just before the nominee camera shots were pulled away. Faith Hill and her management insisted the act was a joke, but left many unconvinced. Her career took a nosedive not long after.

* In 2022, Republican Joe Kent was expected to win UsefulNotes/{{Washington}}'s 3rd congressional district with polling aggregator ''[=FiveThirtyEight=]'' giving him a 98% chance of winning. However, Kent was ultimately defeated by Democrat Marie Glusenkamp Perez by a 1.5 point margin, flipping a seat that Republicans previously held for 12 years. Many post-mortem reports, [[https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/11/marie-gluesenkamp-perezs-win-shows-why-republicans-flopped-this-fall/672110/?utm_source=feed including by]] ''The Atlantic'', blamed Kent's loss on his extremist views and aligning himself with Donald Trump and his electoral fraud conspiracies that drove moderate and independent voters to Perez. It didn't help that Republican voters ousted incumbent Republican Jaime Herrera Beutler in the jungle primary after she voted to impeach Trump following the 2021 Capitol Hill insurrection; given how Beutler was more moderate and won every election in the district since 2010, often by double-digit margins and even when outspent by Democrats, it's highly probable that she would've kept the district had she made it to the general election.

* In 2022, Republican Joe Kent was expected to win UsefulNotes/{{Washington}}'s 3rd congressional district with polling aggregator ''[=FiveThirtyEight=]'' giving him a 98% chance of winning. However, Kent was ultimately defeated by Democrat Marie Glusenkamp Perez by a 1.5 point margin, flipping a seat that Republicans previously held for 12 years. Many post-mortem reports, [[https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/11/marie-gluesenkamp-perezs-win-shows-why-republicans-flopped-this-fall/672110/?utm_source=feed including this one]] by ''The Atlantic'', blamed Kent's loss on his extremist views, controversial endorsement from Donald Trump and peddling of electoral fraud conspiracies that drove moderate and independent voters to Perez. It didn't help that Republican voters ousted incumbent Republican Jaime Herrera Beutler in the primaries after she voted to impeach Trump following the 2021 Capitol Hill insurrection; given how Beutler won every election in the district since 2010, often by double-digit margins and even when outspent by Democrats, it's highly probable that Republican would've kept the district had she been the nominee.

* In ''WesternAnimation/{{Cars}}'': After the first race at the beginning of the movie:

** Truman, UsefulNotes/FranklinDRoosevelt's elevated vice president, was running for a second term against Dewey, the charismatic Governor of UsefulNotes/{{New York|State}}, which would result in a fifth consecutive Democratic presidential victory. Truman seemed doomed to failure: he had low approval ratings, barely earned the nomination of his party, and opinion polls (then in their infancy) had Dewey winning the election in a landslide. Truman's campaign was perpetually cash-short, and nearly all of his aides and even his wife Bess believed that they were going to lose. Dewey on the other hand was coddled by the media, his campaign was a well-funded machine, and some of his staff were so confident in him winning that they had already bought homes in D.C. in preparation for working in his administration. The Democratic Party appeared in shambles, with Strom Thurmond and Henry Wallace leaving the party and running as third party candidates, siphoning off much of Truman's support. 80% of newspapers and magazines endorsed Dewey and had prewritten their election coverage believing he would win, with the ''Chicago Daily Tribune'' going to print with the infamous "Dewey Defeats Truman" bulldog edition headline on election night.
** Truman, [[CorneredRattlesnake believing that he had nothing to lose]], spent the final weeks of the election crisscrossing the country, making up to thirteen campaign stops a day, holding rallies where he ridiculed Dewey's refusal to address specific issues and the Republican-controlled "do nothing" Congress with a wave of relentless and blistering partisan assaults. While this happened, Dewey defaulted to a "run out the clock" strategy, avoiding controversial issues and speaking vaguely of his plans for his presidency, including the now infamous quote "You know that your future is still ahead of you." The major polls were so sure of Dewey's victory that they stopped polling voters weeks before the election, missing the Hail Mary surge of Truman's support from his aggressive campaigning in the final days.
** On election night the returns skewed much more towards Truman than expected, with Dewey barely carrying New York (his home state where he was the sitting governor) and UsefulNotes/{{Pennsylvania}} (then a GOP stronghold thanks to an entrenched Republican political machine in UsefulNotes/{{Philadelphia}} and UsefulNotes/{{Pittsburgh}} only just transitioning away from a similar arrangement). Truman acquired an early lead that he never lost, and reached the electoral votes needed to win by the next morning. What mattered was that Truman had narrowly won UsefulNotes/{{Ohio}}, UsefulNotes/{{California}}, and Illinois, which carried a total of 78 electoral votes.[[note]]Had Dewey won those three states, he would have won the election in the Electoral College, even if he hadn't won the popular vote. Had Dewey won any two of them, Truman would have had the most electoral votes, but the Dixiecrats would have succeeded in their goal of forcing the election into the House of Representatives, which if voting along party lines would give Truman 25 states (a majority), Dewey 20, and three tied. The extreme closeness of the vote in these three states was the major reason why Dewey waited until late on the morning of November 3 to concede.[[/note]]
** Complacency on Dewey's part also aided his defeat. He didn't bother to campaign in states like Ohio and UsefulNotes/{{Wisconsin}} where he had defeated President Roosevelt four years earlier, assuming that he would easily win them again, and they ended up flipping to Truman. Ultimately Dewey's popular vote percentage was slightly lower than it was in 1944. Thurmond and Wallace also didn't end up taking away as many voters from Truman as thought, also a cause of Truman's higher than expected totals. Truman famously posed with the incorrect ''Chicago Tribune'', but we can assume that Dewey was not so enchanted.

* In 2022, Republican Joe Kent was expected to win UsefulNotes/{{Washington}}'s 3rd congressional district with polling aggregator ''[=FiveThirtyEight=]'' giving him 98% chance of winning. However, Kent was ultimately defeated by Democrat Marie Glusenkamp Perez by a 1.5 point margin, flipping a seat that Republicans previously held for 12 years. Many post-mortem reports, [[https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/11/marie-gluesenkamp-perezs-win-shows-why-republicans-flopped-this-fall/672110/?utm_source=feed including this one]] by ''The Atlantic'', blamed Kent's loss on his extremist views, controversial endorsement from Donald Trump and peddling of electoral fraud conspiracies that drove moderate and independent voters to Perez. It didn't help that Republican voters ousted incumbent Republican Jaime Herrera Beutler in the primaries after she voted to impeach Trump following the 2021 Capitol Hill insurrection; given how Beutler won every election in the district since 2010, often by double-digit margins and even when outspent by Democrats, it's highly probable that Republican would've kept the district had she been the nominee.

* In 2022, Republican Joe Kent was expected to win UsefulNotes/{{Washington}}'s 3rd congressional district with polling from outlets like ''[=FiveThirtyEight=]'' giving him 98% chance of winning. However, Kent was ultimately defeated by Democrat Marie Glusenkamp Perez by a 1.5 point margin, flipping a seat that Republicans previously held for 12 years. Many post-mortem reports, [[https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/11/marie-gluesenkamp-perezs-win-shows-why-republicans-flopped-this-fall/672110/?utm_source=feed including this one]] by ''The Atlantic'', blamed Kent's loss on his extremist views, controversial endorsement from Donald Trump and peddling of electoral fraud conspiracies that drove moderate and independent voters to Perez. It didn't help Republicans that Republicans ousted incumbent Republican Jaime Herrera Beutler in the primaries after she voted to impeach Trump following the 2021 Capitol Hill insurrection; given how Beutler won every election in the district since 2010, often by double-digit margins and even when outspent by Democrats, it's highly probable that Republican would've kept the district had she been the nominee.

* Similarly, during the 1976 Democratic presidential primary in Wisconsin, Arizona Congressman Mo Udall had been projected the winner of that primary over front-runner UsefulNotes/JimmyCarter, with some newspapers printing that Udall had won in their headlines and Udall himself proclaiming "Oh, how sweet it is" (Udall was hoping that a win would slow down Carter's momentum to the nomination). Once the votes were counted, it was Carter that won that particular primary by 1% (roughly 7,500 votes) en route to the nomination and the presidency, while Udall would finish a distant second at the Democratic Convention that year. (Udall rather memorably "accepted" defeat by saying "The people have spoken-- the bastards.")

** Truman, UsefulNotes/FranklinDRoosevelt's elevated vice president, was running for a second term against Dewey, the charismatic Governor of New York, which would result in a fifth consecutive Democratic presidential victory. Truman seemed doomed to failure: he had low approval ratings, barely earned the nomination of his party, and opinion polls (then in their infancy) had Dewey winning the election in a landslide. Truman's campaign was perpetually cash-short, and nearly all of his aides and even his wife Bess believed that they were going to lose. Dewey on the other hand was coddled by the media, his campaign was a well-funded machine, and some of his staff were so confident in him winning that they had already bought homes in D.C. in preparation for working in his administration. The Democratic Party appeared in shambles, with Strom Thurmond and Henry Wallace leaving the party and running as third party candidates, siphoning off much of Truman's support. 80% of newspapers and magazines endorsed Dewey and had prewritten their election coverage believing he would win, with the ''Chicago Daily Tribune'' going to print with the infamous "Dewey Defeats Truman" bulldog edition headline on election night.

** On election night the returns skewed much more towards Truman than expected, with Dewey barely carrying New York (his home state where he was the sitting governor) and Pennsylvania (then a GOP stronghold thanks to an entrenched Republican political machine in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh only just transitioning away from a similar arrangement). Truman acquired an early lead that he never lost, and reached the electoral votes needed to win by the next morning. What mattered was that Truman had narrowly won Ohio, California, and Illinois, which carried a total of 78 electoral votes.[[note]]Had Dewey won those three states, he would have won the election in the Electoral College, even if he hadn't won the popular vote. Had Dewey won any two of them, Truman would have had the most electoral votes, but the Dixiecrats would have succeeded in their goal of forcing the election into the House of Representatives, which if voting along party lines would give Truman 25 states (a majority), Dewey 20, and three tied. The extreme closeness of the vote in these three states was the major reason why Dewey waited until late on the morning of November 3 to concede.[[/note]]
** Complacency on Dewey's part also aided his defeat. He didn't bother to campaign in states like Ohio and Wisconsin where he had defeated President Roosevelt four years earlier, assuming that he would easily win them again, and they ended up flipping to Truman. Ultimately Dewey's popular vote percentage was slightly lower than it was in 1944. Thurmond and Wallace also didn't end up taking away as many voters from Truman as thought, also a cause of Truman's higher than expected totals. Truman famously posed with the incorrect ''Chicago Tribune'', but we can assume that Dewey was not so enchanted.
* Funny how the lesson wasn't learned in 2000, when networks prematurely called the election for Bush and then Gore and then Bush again, and many newspapers had to scramble to reprint the front page headline.

* The 1990 US Senate election in Minnesota had incumbent Senator Rudy Boschwitz go up against Paul Wellstone, a political science professor at Carleton College who had never held government office. Boschwitz outraised Wellstone by a 7-to-1 margin and tepidly campaigned, viewing Wellstone as a fringe candidate who posed no serious risk to his re-election bid, and never responded to Wellstone's requests for a debate. [[http://www.nytimes.com/1990/11/11/us/the-1990-elections-minnesota-professor-s-everyman-appeal-wins-a-senate-seat.html The New York Times]] described Wellstone's campaign style as "[wearing] work shirts and jeans, Mr. Wellstone traveled the state in a rickety school bus, wrote his own speeches and stayed in people's homes rather than hotels." Boschwitz didn't hit the campaign trail in earnest until late October polls showed a gap of only a few percentage points separating the two, down from the large leads that he had held throughout the year, though Boschwitz still usually polled ahead. Wellstone's everyman image struck a chord with voters, and he won the election by 48,000 votes and a margin of 2.5%.

* In 2012, it was widely assumed that the North Dakota U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Democrat Kent Conrad would be an easy Republican pickup given the lean of the state. The state's at-large U.S. representative Rick Berg won the GOP nomination and was considered a shoe-in to be the state's next U.S. senator, though Democratic nominee Heidi Heitkamp proved to be a surprisingly strong campaigner. Polls in the deep-red state varied, some showed a close race while others had Heitkamp trailing Berg by double-digits. Heitkamp managed to pull off a narrow 0.9% win, impressive considering fellow Democrat President Obama simultaneously lost the state by nearly 20-points in the presidential election. The next morning, she [[https://www.businessinsider.com/heitkamp-dewey-beats-truman-2012-11 recreated]] the iconic Truman photo, holding up a newspaper showing its final pre-election poll showing her 10-points behind.
* In 2014, Eric Cantor, then the House Majority Leader, was confident that he would cruise to reelection in his central Virginia district even though his primary challenger David Brat, a college professor who had never held government office, had been gaining ground against him in polls, running on an anti-establishment and right-wing populist platform. Cantor had the backing of the national party and outspent Brat 40-to-1. Cantor apparently didn't consider Brat much of a threat and rented out a large ballroom for what he assumed would be his victory party. Soon after polls closed, the race was called for Brat, who won by a comfortable 10% margin. To be "Cantored" even became political terminology for when a high-ranking politician is unexpectedly defeated by an unknown from within their own party.
** 2018 had a few Cantorings. In New York's 14th district, Joe Crowley was one of the top-ranking Democrats in Congress and had been frequently mentioned as a potential speaker should his party regain control of the House. Crowley had served for ten terms and never had to compete in a primary until Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a 28-year-old bartender and Democratic Socialist running her first campaign, challenged him. Crowley didn't perceive her as a threat-- the [[https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/27/nyregion/ocasio-cortez-crowley-primary-upset.html only available polling]] showed him 36 points ahead. In the end it wasn't even close, Ocasio-Cortez won by a comfortable 15% margin in what the media referred to as a [[https://www.cnn.com/2018/06/26/politics/joe-crowley-alexandria-ocasio-cortez-new-york-upset/index.html "titanic upset"]], and Crowley couldn't concede because his campaign never bothered to ask for her phone number. This set the stage for another longtime establishment figure in the Democratic Party, Boston's Mike Capuano, to be ousted by Ayanna Pressley in a [[https://www.wbur.org/news/2018/08/02/wbur-poll-capuano-pressley-7th-district similar upset]] after polls had her trailing by [[https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/politics/2018/09/04/capuano-pressley-count-experience-support-win-primary/BexLGYivjWMnwv4jaYTC1N/story.html double-digits]] less than a month out.

* The 2016 presidential election between Hillary Clinton and UsefulNotes/DonaldTrump was one of the biggest pundit failures in history,[[note]]Many people blamed polling for the mistake, but it was always closer than people thought. They also did not understand the concept of correlated error (e.g. if there's a polling error in Wisconsin in the direction of the Republican, then there's likely to be similar ones in the demographically similar states of Michigan and Pennsylvania as well)[[/note]] to the point that one could call it "[[OddlyNamedSequel2ElectricBoogaloo Dewey v. Truman 2: Electric Boogaloo]]". Prior to the election, Clinton was considered to have handily won all three presidential debates, led in nearly all polls, and forecasters universally predicted that she would win with an unbreakable 270-plus vote "firewall" and Trump never had a prayer of winning. [=FiveThirtyEight=], the most conservative forecaster, gave her a 71% chance of winning, while The New York Times pegged her at 85% and Huffpost Pollster at 98%. Clinton's campaign planned a massive victory rally at New York City's Javits Convention Center, a fireworks display over the Hudson River on election night, and [[LiteralMetaphor confetti falling from its glass ceiling to resemble shattering]]. Trump held a modest election night event in the New York Hilton ballroom, [[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-14/trump-says-he-expected-to-lose-election-because-of-poll-results expecting to only deliver a short concession speech]]. Newsweek even printed and shipped to stores a commemorative issue celebrating Clinton's victory as the first woman president. On election night, Trump unexpectedly won Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin[[note]](a state that Clinton was apparently so sure she would win that she never set foot in it during the campaign)[[/note]] by narrow margins, all states that Clinton had an overestimated but still comfortable polling lead in, and none of which had voted Republican in a Presidential election since the 1980s. This is attributed to the high turnout from non-college educated white voters and a decline in reliable Democratic demographics like unionized workers and African Americans. Trump won the electoral college and therefore the presidency. While the polling industry was widely criticized for its perceived overconfidence in Clinton winning, the one thing that most polls did accurately predict was that Clinton would receive substantially more votes than Trump nationwide, with her winning the popular vote by 2.9 million and a margin of 48%-46%.

* In 1980, 27-year old Chris Smith challenged longtime Democratic Congressman Frank Thompson of New Jersey. He had previously challenged Thompson in 1978 and lost 61%–37%. He was thought to have no chance of winning, but then Thompson was indicted in the ABSCAM sting operation, where he was caught taking a bribe. The controversy of the scandal, combined with Ronald Reagan's strong performance in the district during the presidential election allowed Smith to defeat Thompson 57%–41%. When Smith was up for reelection in 1982, many had dismissed his win as a fluke and expected the Democratic challenger, New Jersey Senate President Joseph P. Merlino, to win. After one of their debates, when Smith offered pleasantries Merlino rebuked him, saying "Beat it, kid." However, despite Democrats regaining many of the House seats lost in 1980, Smith managed to win reelection 53%-47%. As of 2021, Smith is still in office, having won at least 55% of the vote in each subsequent election.

* Virtually every prognosticator in 2018 expected Republican Rep. Steve Russell to easily hold onto his seat in Oklahoma's 5th congressional district—on average polls had him [[https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2018-midterm-election-forecast/house/oklahoma/5/ ahead by 13%]]. In the end, Kendra Horn, his Democratic challenger, tapped into anger at outgoing Republican Governor Mary Fallin's unpopular education policies, and a strong performance at the top of the ticket by gubernatorial nominee Drew Edmondson, to squeak out a 1-point win and becoming the first Democrat to represent the district since the 1970s.

* Done twice in South Carolina's 1st congressional district, based in the suburbs of Charleston, in the 2018 cycle. The seat had been held by former governor Mark Sanford since 2013, after Republican Tim Scott was appointed to the U.S. Senate (Sanford actually held the seat before he was governor). However, Sanford's libertarian politics made him quite unpopular with mainstream Republicans. In a primary that went completely under the radar, he lost renomination for the seat to state representative Katie Arrington, a staunch conservative. Given the fact that Trump carried the district by 13 points, it seemed that Arrington was well on her way to Congress. However, she proved to be a little too far to the right for suburbanites to handle, and she narrowly lost her bid to Joe Cunningham, who became the first Democrat to win the district since the 1980s.

* In 2022, Republican Joe Kent was expected to win the Washington's 3rd congressional district with polling from outlets like ''[=FiveThirtyEight=]'' giving him 98% chance of winning. However, Kent was ultimately defeated by Democrat Marie Glusenkamp Perez by a 1.5 point margin, flipping a seat that Republicans previously held for 12 years. Many post-mortem reports, [[https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/11/marie-gluesenkamp-perezs-win-shows-why-republicans-flopped-this-fall/672110/?utm_source=feed including this one]] by ''The Atlantic'', blamed Kent's loss on his extremist views, controversial endorsement from Donald Trump and peddling of electoral fraud conspiracies that drove moderate and independent voters to Perez. It didn't help Republicans that Republicans ousted incumbent Republican Jaime Herrera Beutler in the primaries after she voted to impeach Trump following the 2021 Capitol Hill insurrection; given how Beutler won every election in the district since 2010, often by double-digit margins and even when outspent by Democrats, it's highly probable that Republican would've kept the district had she been the nominee.

* At the 2021 Academy Awards, the late Creator/ChadwickBoseman was [[https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/race/oscars-2021-analysis-how-chadwick-lost-frances-won-and-the-oscars-went-off-the-rails the heavy favorite]] to win a posthumous Best Actor Oscar for his final role in ''Film/MaRaineysBlackBottom'', having succumbed to colon cancer eight months earlier. The producers bucked decades of tradition by presenting the Best Actor category last, hoping to end the show on an emotional moment, and had Boseman's widow in attendance ready to give a speech. The winner? Creator/AnthonyHopkins for ''Film/TheFather''. To make things more awkward, Hopkins wasn't even in attendance- being 83 years old, he didn't want to travel such a distance during the COVID-19 pandemic and he stated that the producers refused to let him attend the event remotely via Zoom, a fact later confirmed by producer Creator/StevenSoderbergh. As a result, presenter Creator/JoaquinPhoenix simply said he was accepting it on Hopkins' behalf and, rather than the emotional moment the producers were expecting, the show ended in an incredibly abrupt fashion.[[note]](If anything, the show's climax proved once and for all the the producers really don't know the winners in advance.)[[/note]] When Hopkins later gave an acceptance speech, he admitted that even he didn't expect himself to win.

* In ''Big Iron'', Texas Red had already killed 20 men in the past, so the townsfolk of Agua Fria assume that The Arizona Ranger is going to Texas Red's 21st kill when he gets into a QuickDraw contest with him. It's because of this that the swiftness of the Ranger is still talked about today.

** And on the subject of papal elections: "A man who enters the conclave as pope will often leave it as [a] cardinal".

[[folder:Myths & Religion]]
* An ancient example: the Literature/BookOfEsther in the Bible. King Ahasuerus asks his evil advisor Haman, "What should be done for the man the king delights to honor?" Thinking he is the man the king is referring to, Haman suggests an elaborate parade. But the man in question turns out to be Mordecai, the hero of the book and Haman's nemesis. And what's more, Haman himself is put in charge of carrying it out.

* In 2022, Republican Joe Kent was expected to win the Washington's 3rd congressional district with polling from outlets like ''FiveThirtyEight'' giving him 98% chance of winning. However, Kent was ultimately defeated by Democrat Marie Glusenkamp Perez by a 1.5 point margin, flipping a seat that Republicans previously held for 12 years. [[https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/11/marie-gluesenkamp-perezs-win-shows-why-republicans-flopped-this-fall/672110/?utm_source=feed A post-mortem analysis]] by ''The Atlantic'' blamed Kent's extremist views, controversial endorsement from Donald Trump and peddling of electoral fraud conspiracies that drove moderate and independent voters to Perez, who herself won over these voters with her blue collar image. It didn't help Republicans that Republicans ousted Jaime Herrera Beutler in the primaries after she voted to impeach Trump following the 2021 Capitol Hill insurrection; given how Beutler won every election in the district since 2010, often by double-digit margins, it's highly probable that she would've handily kept the district in Republican hands had she been the nominee.

** On election night the returns skewed much more towards Truman than expected, with Dewey barely carrying New York (his home state where he was the sitting governor) and Pennsylvania. Truman acquired an early lead that he never lost, and reached the electoral votes needed to win by the next morning. What mattered was that Truman had narrowly won Ohio, California, and Illinois, which carried a total of 78 electoral votes.[[note]]Had Dewey won those three states, he would have won the election in the Electoral College, even if he hadn't won the popular vote. Had Dewey won any two of them, Truman would have had the most electoral votes, but the Dixiecrats would have succeeded in their goal of forcing the election into the House of Representatives, which if voting along party lines would give Truman 25 states (a majority), Dewey 20, and three tied. The extreme closeness of the vote in these three states was the major reason why Dewey waited until late on the morning of November 3 to concede.[[/note]]

* In the 2006 World Series, the Detroit Tigers were such heavy favorites over the St. Louis Cardinals, who had barely limped into the playoffs with only a slight winning record of 83-78 and defeated two heavily flawed teams (the San Diego Padres who had a very weak offense for a playoff team, and the New York Mets who were dealing with multiple injuries to important starting pitchers) to reach the World Series, that USA Today jokingly predicted that the Tigers would with the best-of-seven series in an impossible three games. The Cardinals easily won the series in five games.

* In 2022, Republican Joe Kent was expected to win the Washington's 3rd congressional district with polling from outlets like ''FiveThirtyEight'' giving him 98% chance of winning. However, Kent was ultimately defeated by Democrat Marie Glusenkamp Perez by 1.5 points margin, flipping a seat that Republicans previously held for 12 years. [[https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/11/marie-gluesenkamp-perezs-win-shows-why-republicans-flopped-this-fall/672110/?utm_source=feed A post-mortem analysis]] by ''The Atlantic'' blamed Kent's extremist views, controversial endorsement from Donald Trump and peddling of electoral fraud conspiracies that drove moderate and independent voters to Perez, who herself won over these voters with her blue collar image and economic populism. It didn't help Republicans that Republicans ousted Jaime Herrera Beutler in the primaries for her vote to impeach Trump; given how Beutler won every election in the district since 2010, often by double-digit margins, it's highly probable that she would've handily kept the district in Republican hands had she been the nominee.

* In 2022, Republican Joe Kent was expected to win the Washington's 3rd congressional district with polling from credible publications ''FiveThirtyEight'' giving him 98% chance of winning. However, Kent was ultimately defeated by Democrat Marie Glusenkamp Perez by a 1.5% margin with the supposedly safe Republican seat flipping Democratic for the first time in 12 years. [[https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/11/marie-gluesenkamp-perezs-win-shows-why-republicans-flopped-this-fall/672110/?utm_source=feed A post-mortem analysis]] by ''The Atlantic'' blamed Kent's extremist views, controversial endorsement from Donald Trump and peddling of electoral fraud conspiracies, which lead to moderates and independents either boycotting the election or voting for Perez, who herself won over these voters with her blue collar image and economic populism. It didn't help Republicans that Kent ousted the incumbent Jaime Herrera Beutler in primaries for her vote to impeach Trump; given how Beutler won every election in the district since 2010, often by double-digit margins, it's highly probable that she would've handily kept the district in Republican hands had she been the nominee.

* The 2016 presidential election between Hillary Clinton and UsefulNotes/DonaldTrump was one of the biggest pundit failures in history,[[note]]Many people blamed polling for the mistake, but it was always closer than people thought. They also did not understand the concept of correlated error (e.g. if there's a polling error in Wisconsin in the direction of the Republican, then there's likely to be similar ones in the demographically similar states of Michigan and Pennsylvania as well)[[/note]] to the point that one could call it "[[OddlyNamedSequel2ElectricBoogaloo Dewey v. Truman 2: Electric Boogaloo]]". Prior to the election, Clinton was considered to have handily won all three presidential debates, led in nearly all polls, and forecasters universally predicted that she would win with an unbreakable 270-plus vote "firewall" and Trump never had a prayer of winning. [=FiveThirtyEight=], the most conservative forecaster, gave her a 71% chance of winning, while The New York Times pegged her at 85% and Huffpost Pollster at 98%. Clinton's campaign planned a massive victory rally at New York City's Javits Convention Center, a fireworks display over the Hudson River on election night, and [[LiteralMetaphor confetti falling from its glass ceiling to resemble shattering]]. Trump held a modest election night event in the New York Hilton ballroom, [[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-14/trump-says-he-expected-to-lose-election-because-of-poll-results expecting to only deliver a short concession speech]]. Newsweek even printed and shipped to stores a commemorative issue celebrating Clinton's victory as the first woman president. On election night, Trump unexpectedly won Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin[[note]](a state that Clinton was apparently so sure she would win that she never set foot in it during the campaign)[[/note]] by narrow margins, all states that Clinton had an overestimated but still comfortable polling lead in, and none of which had voted Republican in a Presidential election since the 1980s. This is attributed to the high turnout from non-college educated white voters and a decline in reliable Democratic demographics. Trump won the electoral college and therefore the presidency. While the polling industry was widely criticized for its perceived overconfidence in Clinton winning, the one thing that most polls did accurately predict was that Clinton would receive substantially more votes than Trump nationwide, with her winning the popular vote by 2.9 million and a margin of 48%-46%.

* For Germany's 2021 federal election, the incumbent center-right [=CDU=]-[=CSU=] coalition party seemed poised to stay in power. Despite some setbacks like attempts to succeed the popular outgoing Chancellor UsefulNotes/AngelaMerkel, the party held double-digit poll lead over their biggest rival, the center-left [=SPD=] party. Furthermore, their outlook was emboldened by both declining [=SPD=] membership and recent election losses by leftist parties in Europe. However, the election resulted in the [=SPD=] winning the most seats while the [=CDU=]-[=CSU=] suffered their worst defeat since ''1945''. After the forming a coalition with the Greens and [=FDP=], [=SPD=] leader Olaf Scholz became the new Chancellor and the [=CDU=]-[=CSU=] was relegated into an opposition block. While some attributed the [=SPD=]'s win to the party's pro-welfare policies, several voters chose [=SPD=] because they liked Scholz respectable and stable personality whereas [=CDU=]-[=CSU=]'s leader Armin Laschet was seen as elitist and aloof especially after he was caught on camera laughing at flooded towns.

[[folder:Film - Animated]]

--> '''Announcer:''' Ladies and gentlemen, for the first time in Piston Cup history...
--> '''Lightning:''' A rookie has won the Piston Cup. ''(leaps through paper partition)'' YES!
--> '''Announcer:''' We have a three-way tie!
--> '''Lightning:''' ''(shocked expression)''
* In ''WesternAnimation/TheSpongeBobSquarePantsMovie'', Mr Krabs announces that the new manager of the Krusty Krab 2 has "a name you all know, it starts with an S!". [=SpongeBob=] assumes the best, but has to humiliate himself ''three times'' over microphone before realising that the new manager is actually Squidward.

[[folder:Film - Live-Action]]

* In the 2007 adaptation of ''Film/{{Hairspray}}'', Amber and Tracy are the two most likely to win the title of Miss Teenage Hairspray. As the winner is announced, Amber steps forward with a smile to accept the award, only to find that she lost to [[spoiler:Little Inez.]]

* Inverted in ''Literature/AroundTheWorldInEightyDays''. Phileas Fogg, Aouda, and Passepartout arrive in London just in time to hear the bells signaling the deadline for finishing the race against time and they're nowhere near the finish line. Phileas resigns himself to his fate, decides to marry Aouda, and sends Passepartout to get a preacher. Passepartout returns with the news that they actually arrived in London the day before the deadline and they can still make the finish. It turns out that when they were adjusting their watches to local time, they ended up erasing an entire day from their journey. [[note]] The book was written before the establishment of the UsefulNotes/InternationalDateLine. [[/note]]

[[folder:Live Action TV]]

--> '''Rose:''' "It's a fix! She's dead! She doesn't need that on her mantel! ''SHE'S'' ON HER MANTEL!"

--> ''How do I feel about not winning Hottest In the Office this year? Um, I'm very relieved. How do-how do you even judge something like that? What is his criteria even? It's-it's so subjective.' '

* An early 2010s story arc in ''ComicStrip/{{Luann}}'' featured most of the primary female cast members entering a school beauty pageant, with resident AlphaBitch (and former pageant winner, though she was stripped of her title for orchestrating a financial scam) Tiffany so certain that she will win that she berates the emcees into announcing her win, before [[VerbalBackspace correcting herself to "the winner".]] When the winner's name is read, Tiffany is halfway to the stage before she realises the emcees have announced Rosa Aragones (who was introduced into the comic in this arc) as the winner.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 4}}'', a terminal in the ruins of the Boston Bugle building has an article stating that Boston's baseball team[[note]]assumed to be the Red Sox, but [[BlandNameProduct not named in-game]] in order to avoid licensing issues[[/note]] was on the verge of winning the World Series for the first time in 159 years, with Game 4 set for Saturday, October 23, 2077, and the article proclaiming that the only thing that could stop Boston from completing the sweep was either "[[TemptingFate an act of God]], or [[ExactWords some obscene calamity of man.]]" [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt Guess what happens on October 23, 2077?]] It's just made worse as in the ''Fallout'' timeline, unlike in RealLife, Boston never broke the [[{{Curse}} Curse of the Bambino]].

* Website/{{Reddit}} has the [[https://www.reddit.com/r/Prematurecelebration/ r/prematurecelebration]] subreddit, which collects examples of people [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin celebrating prematurely.]]

* In the first chapter of ''[[{{Webcomic/Morphe}} morphE]]'' Tyler dives in to his fight-to-the-death with Billy and assumes that he has the thing beat. Unfortunately he didn't understand the game was not about killing his opponent but about instigating a near death experience to trigger an awakening as a mage. Amical shoots him in the shoulder to even the fight out and try to keep Billy as a mage.

* Played for laughs on ''WesternAnimation/{{Arthur}}'' when George, whose performance we never actually saw, won the school talent show with some kind of pogo-stick act. [[LampshadeHanging Lampshaded]] seasons later when George won again (complete with StockFootage of the award announcement).

*** And finally, much later, during ''[[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0155572/ Bugs Bunny's Wild World of Sports]]'' (basically an half-hour ClipShow), Daffy has "wised up" and suspects all through [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0eMSiIR3hU the special]] that Bugs will win the award. [[spoiler: Foghorn Leghorn wins the award.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/Hero108'': The episode "Turtle Cannon Competition III" begins with an awards show, where [[FiveManBand FirstSquad]] is up for an award for "Best Teamwork", alongside other divisions of Big Green. Their rivals [[AlwaysSecondBest Second Squad]] are initially announced as the winners, only for one of them to cause [[BigGood Ape-Truly]] to realise his mistake and announce First Squad as the real winners.