If we're talking gubernatorial gains, Dems need to pick up the following:
NV, NM, CO, FL, IA, WI, MI, IL, NJ, NH, ME, KS and some of OH, GA, MD and MA.
Flipping New Jersey, New Mexico, Nevada, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts and Vermont would give us total D control in those states. Those should all be priorities.
In Colorado we need to hold the governor's seat and flip the Senate which would take exactly one seat.
Likewise, we could flip the Maine Senate just by winning one seat and we'd also need the governor's mansion, though if Collins jumps in then good luck.
New Hampshire is fully R-controlled but the House is so large it's easily subject to big swings. The Senate would just need three seats to go D and Sununu is up for re-election.
Basically I think our biggest goal in 2018 re:state government races should be to gain as many D trifectas as possible because we currently only have six (California, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Oregon, Rhode Island). We can win one in Washington by flipping a Senate seat this November in a special election. If we won that and then won all the states I just mentioned, we'd have full control in 17 of the 20 Clinton states.
The only exceptions would be Minnesota (we can win the House next year, but the Senate which is one seat away from flipping isn't up until 2020), Virginia (likewise, including a one-seat margin in the Senate, but that would be in 2019), and New York (fuck the IDC). Still we should try to make as many gains in those states as possible. Say winning the VA House and MN House while giving Democrats at least nominal control over the NY Senate, and maybe primarying a few IDC assholes out of power.
Trump states:
Governor's races in the other states you mentioned will be important (FL, GA, IA, KS, MI, OH, WI) because with the exception of Iowa all of them have been brutally gerrymandered. I could conceive of flipping individual chambers in a really good year, like the Michigan House or the Wisconsin Senate along with their gubernatorial contests. If Trump backlash is big in Iowa we could paint the state blue overnight since it does have fair maps, though I'm skeptical given its hard lurch right.
Like whyamihere mentioned, Arizona is a potential pickup opportunity as well, and Democrats could flip the Senate with just three seats (or tie it with two).
Wild card here is North Carolina which will have new legislative maps. They may have elections this year depending on how the courts rule, but even if they don't that still creates an opportunity for another D trifecta. The other red states with Dem governors (Montana, West Virginia, Alaska with its independent) probably aren't electing D legislatures anytime soon.
Ok I just vomited a lot of information but I just think the GOP's seemingly iron fist on a lot of these state governments is actually rather tenuous, and 2018 (2017 in some cases) could be fucking huge for us.
I mean, re: Arizona, PPP had Garcia (D) up on Ducey (R) 44-42 2 days ago. That should not be a close race for Ducey.
Arizona could very well replace Wisconsin in the electoral math. Obama didn't bother, but it was a 3-point race with Clinton and Trump as it was with Flake and Carmona in 2012.