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Usually, the NFL's Head Coach of the Year honor adheres to a simple pattern. It frequently acts as a type of mea culpa. Our apologies we misjudged your team in our pre-campaign projections.

Theoretically, it's a clear-cut path: the coach who oversaw the largest resurgence receives the award. However, it creates an yearly debate about preseason outlooks and whether we're truly rewarding excellent coaching or simply the biggest upset.

Yet this year's race is distinctly different. The list of contenders is exceptionally deep. It has been the year of turnarounds. The league has been messy, with reigning conference champions falling away and recent underperformers ascending collectively. Under an typical year, a coach leading the Denver Broncos to the summit of the conference would make him the overwhelming favorite. But in this wild and fun season, he's facing several other outstanding coaches.

This is how the ideal vote could be structured.

5) The Chicago Bears Coach, His Team, Their Record

Voters for Coach of the Year selectors love signal-callers. History shows this. A certain coach in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. A third in 2022. Should you transform a quarterback, you're halfway home.

Ben Johnson didn't merely corrected Caleb Williams; he's unlocked him. In the right environment, the QB has been given the chance to showcase his otherworldly talent. From Week 9, the Bears rank number four in offensive Expected Points Added per play. That's not a hot streak – it's prolonged excellence. Under Johnson, the quarterback has become more confident, far less careless, and has eagerly submitted to the system instead of improvising. It is an offense designed solely in the coach's vision: a bully-ball run game, a steady dose of play-action passes and a innovative passing attack that frees wide-open receivers all over the field. The QB has capitalized. And when easy reads weren't there, he's been able to create big plays from nothing.

The coach came to Chicago with a defined offensive philosophy. Almost each decision – overhauling the offensive line, utilizing the pass-catchers, transforming Williams into a rhythm passer – has succeeded. That's uncommon for a first-year skipper. And it's even more uncommon yet for a coach who entered the building with the immense expectations Johnson did. For consecutive straight offseasons, he was the most sought-after name on the coaching carousel. However when it comes to hiring a head coach, there are zero sure things. Remarkably, he has met expectations – and even exceeded them. He's demonstrated not just to be a offensive genius but the kind of culture builder that can inject fresh energy into an organization.

In a normal season, he would be the clear-cut choice. Yet this isn't a typical campaign!

The area where Johnson's candidacy comes a bit unstuck is on the defensive side. The Bears presently rank 25th in defensive success rate. They are relying on takeaways, and takeaways are famously fickle. Coaches can focus on creating turnovers, but no one can guarantee it. Johnson is on the ballot because the offense is sustainable. He's ranked lower because variance is doing an outsized share of the defensive work. If not for a few bounces of the ball, the Bears would be several wins behind. It's been an exceptional turnaround, and the core is in place for sustained success. But Johnson falls short here.

4) The Jacksonville Jaguars Coach, Jacksonville Jaguars, Their Record

Coen is in a comparable spot to his counterpart. He's a fellow first-time head coach who has masterminded a swift turnaround. Over the crucial final weeks of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the finest all-around ball of his professional life. And he's also spearheaded the remaking of a defense that now sits at number five in the league in EPA per play.

What's more notably, Coen has mastered the off-field aspects, which was not a given following his early public appearances and some of his offseason decisions.

Coen took over the Jaguars with an exceptionally raw coaching staff. In contrast to other coaches, who packed their staff with the ideal staff blend of new ideas and experience, Coen bet on first-timers. From the leader himself to coordinators to assistant coaches, the Jags are filled with first-timers. That kind of setup is intriguing on paper, but often fails in practice – with other teams are a cautionary tale – because everybody is learning a new job on the fly. Yet Coen has pulled the entire group and all elements together.

Following an early hot start, there was a risk that the season would veer off the track. A mid-year setback had the team stumbling again. That's usually when leaders panic and change too much. Coen did not. Rather, he simplified things. The offense stopped chasing home-run answers and started hunting consistent ones. Coen refocused the offense around key players and the running game, and asked his QB to use his mobility more often.

The outcomes are clear. The Jags have won multiple games in a row and will be the AFC's No 3 seed. He receives the tiniest deduction in the standings because he inherited a skilled roster, but he has proven he can maximize that talent.

3) Mike Macdonald, Seattle Seahawks, 13-3

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

Moving on from a incumbent, bringing in a different signal-caller and partnering him with an innovative offensive coordinator could have derailed the campaign in October. Instead, it shaped it. Through the mid point of the season, the acquisition was an MVP front-runner. He has fallen away after that time, slipping to 23rd in efficiency per dropback over the latter part of the season, putting him just one spot ahead of peers.

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