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Ordinarily, the National Football League's Coach of the Year honor follows a simple pattern. It often acts as a type of mea culpa. Our apologies we got wrong your franchise in our pre-campaign predictions.

In theory, it's a clear-cut trajectory: the skipper who oversaw the largest resurgence wins the award. However, it creates an yearly debate about expectations and whether we're actually rewarding superior leadership or simply the greatest shock.

But the current race is fundamentally unique. The list of contenders is exceptionally strong. It has been the campaign of turnarounds. The league has been unpredictable, with reigning division champions declining and recent also-rans improving collectively. In an ordinary season, Sean Payton leading the his team to the top of the AFC would make him the clear front-runner. Yet in this wild and entertaining year, he's competing with five other exceptional candidates.

Here is how the ideal vote should be structured.

5) Ben Johnson, His Team, 11-5

Coach of the Year voters love signal-callers. History shows this. A certain coach in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. When you fix a quarterback, you're well on your way to winning the award.

The Bears' head coach hasn't just fixed his young quarterback; he's freed him. In the right ecosystem, Williams has been given the chance to showcase his rare ability. From Week 9, the Bears sit at fourth in offensive Expected Points Added per play. That's not a hot streak – it's consistent performance. Under his guidance, Williams has become more confident, far less careless, and has willingly submitted to the system rather than improvising. It is an offense designed entirely in Johnson's vision: a bully-ball run game, a heavy dose of play-action and a imaginative aerial game that creates wide receiver targets consistently. Williams has thrived. And when openings haven't been there, he's been capable to spin magic out of broken plays.

The coach came to Chicago with a specific offensive vision. Almost each decision – rebuilding the offensive line, featuring the tight ends, turning Williams into a rhythm passer – has paid off. This is rare for a first-year head coach. And it's even more uncommon yet for a coach who entered the organization with the level of expectations Johnson did. For two straight offseasons, he was the hottest candidate on the coaching carousel. However when it comes to hiring a leader, there are zero guarantees. Remarkably, Johnson has lived up to the hype – and even exceeded them. He's demonstrated not only to be a offensive dork but the type of leader that can inject new life into an franchise.

During a ordinary season, Johnson would be the clear-cut favorite. Yet the current isn't a typical campaign!

Where Johnson's candidacy runs slightly into trouble is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense currently sit 25th in defensive success rate. They are relying on turnovers, and turnovers are famously unreliable. Coaches can focus on ball disruption, but nobody can ensure it. Johnson is on the ballot because the offense is sustainable. He's not higher because variance is doing an outsized share of the defensive work. With a few bounces of the ball, the team would be two victories worse off. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the core is established for sustained success. However Johnson comes up just short here.

4) Liam Coen, His Team, Their Record

Coen is in a comparable situation to Johnson. He's a fellow first-time head coach who has orchestrated a swift turnaround. Over the stretch run of the season, he has his franchise quarterback playing the best all-around football of his professional life. And he's also overseen the transformation of a defense that now sits at fifth in the league in EPA per play.

What's more notably, he has mastered the intangibles stuff, which was not a certainty following his initial press conference appearances and some of his preseason decisions.

The coach took over Jacksonville with an exceptionally raw coaching staff. In contrast to Johnson, who surrounded themselves with the ideal coaching cocktail of new ideas and veteran savvy, Coen trusted newbies. From the head coach on down to coordinators to position coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with first-timers. That kind of approach is exciting on paper, but often collapses in reality – with other teams are a cautionary tale – because everybody is figuring out a new job in real-time. But Coen has pulled the entire group and all elements into sync.

After an initial strong beginning, there was a chance that the campaign would go off the rails. A mid-year collapse caused the Jags stumbling once more. That's typically when leaders overcorrect. He did not. Rather, he simplified the approach. Jacksonville stopped chasing home-run answers and started seeking consistent ones. The coach refocused the offense around key players and the running game, and asked Lawrence to use his legs more.

The results are evident. The Jaguars have won seven games in a row and will be the conference's No 3 seed. Coen receives the slightest knock in the rankings because he inherited a talented roster, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that roster.

3) The Seattle Seahawks Coach, His Team, 13-3

Every Coach of the Year narrative has a pivotal decision. For the Seahawks coach, it was his quarterback move.

Parting ways from a veteran, bringing in a different quarterback and partnering him with an new offensive coordinator might have ended the season in the early weeks. Rather, it shaped it. Through the mid point of the year, the acquisition was an MVP candidate. He has fallen away after that hot streak, slipping to 23rd in EPA per dropback over the latter part of the season, placing him only one spot ahead of other QBs.

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