Well, I can make this year's Republican primaries into such.
POD: Fred Thompson announces his entry into the race on July 4, not September 5. Late, but the two months' extra campaigning allows him to prevent the complete collapse of his campaign in December OTL. Otherwise, things go similarly; Huckabee booms in Iowa, Romney remains as the early-state frontrunner, McCain's campaign begins to revive. The main casualty is Rudy Giuliani, with a lot of his earlier support going to other candidates.
Huckabee wins Iowa in what is effectively a three-way tie with Romney and Thompson. McCain wins New Hampshire, Romney wins Michigan. Here Thompson's early focus on South Carolina pays off, with a narrow victory in the primary. Four candidates can all claim the momentum, and McCain never gains the early support from disaffected Rudyites and 'lesser of evils' voters that he did in OTL. Florida ends in a mess, with the winner, Romney, on 23% of the vote, narrowly ahead of Giuliani, who decides to press on until after February 5 (hoping to take advantage of a divided field)
February 5 arrives, and it's an absolute mess. The split field allows Ron Paul to claim victories in Montana, Alaska and North Dakota, with only a quarter of the vote in each. Huckabee wins the deep south, Romney wins the caucuses and California, Thompson wins the upper south and Missouri, Giuliani wins New York and McCain wins everywhere else. The delegate leader at the end of the day is Romney, but no candidate is raising any funds, all their supporters hate each other, every candidate has more than 100 delegates and every candidate still considers themselves to have a decent shot at the nomination.
Nightmarish? It gets worse, as Newt Gingrich seeks to be 'the compromise candidate', taking advantage of a weak field. He jumps in at CPAC on February 8; he takes Virginia the next week, with McCain triumphing in Maryland and DC. Giuliani and Thompson endorse McCain, giving him a narrow delegate lead over Romney. Huckabee's evangelical supporters take advantage of the split in the 'mainstream conservative' vote between McCain, Romney and Gingrich, to give him a 30% victory in Wisconsin. To this point, no one has won a primary outside their home state with more than 40% of the vote.
On March 4, McCain wins Vermont and Rhode Island; Romney wins Ohio; and Gingrich wins Texas, narrowly. The six weeks until the next primary are a nightmare of sniping, leaking, staff defections, massive debt accumulation, negative advertising and religious slurs. Gingrich, whose campaign failed to raise sufficient funds once the novelty wore off, drops out, endorsing Romney. McCain mortgages three houses to pay for campaign expenses. Ron Paul, with 56 delegates, is wooed by all three candidates; this is seen as a reason for Romney's increasing hawkishness on immigration and Huckabee's coded appeal to anti-war sentiment.
McCain wins Pennsylvania on April 22, and Indiana the next week. Huckabee endorses McCain for a guaranteed spot as vice-president. Romney, decrying a 'crooked bargain', announces his intention to run as an independent candidate in the general election, and withdraws from the race. McCain still loses Idaho and South Dakota to Romney even after he leaves.
In the end, the primary has cost hundreds of millions of dollars; destroyed the political credibility of the Republican primary; resulted in a winner with less than 40% of the popular vote and less than half the delegates; and leaves McCain a crippled nominee for the fall.
That's not as bad as it could be, but it's close enough.