Mario was the underdog against Cloud. Against Crono in 2003, he wasn't the favorite either - both characters had close to 50/50 support. He certainly wasn't anything like Link.
Zelda has never pulled off a single rally except for that Draven match - sure, part of it is that Zelda usually doesn't need rallies - but we saw nothing against Cloud or L-Block or Undertale. Draven provided the sense that an extremely powerful, outside, force was trampling the contest underfoot - and brought out the best in Link.
Weve had many matches with intense dueling rallies.
As both entrants cant be the favorites, the idea that favorites cant rally is clearly false.
And how many times has a perceived favorite won after a rally battle?
I dont know, mustve happened at some point.
Depends what your even mean by favorite. Bracket/pre-contest favorite, or day before match favorite? These can be pretty different.
And given the number of very close rally battles weve had, the results could have been flipped easily. Just because a rallied favorite barely lost, doesnt mean they couldnt have won.
I'm defining favorite as the character that an outsider would perceive as the character that would be naturally more popular on Gamefaqs. I can't think of any cases where there was a strong favorite who won a rally battle.
Why would an outsider think Cloud is stronger on this site than Mario in 2K2?