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Typically, the National Football League's Coach of the Year honor follows a straightforward script. It commonly acts as a form of mea culpa. Sorry we misjudged your team in our preseason projections.

Theoretically, it's a clear-cut line: the coach who engineered the largest improvement receives the prize. In practice, it sparks an yearly discussion about preseason outlooks and whether we're truly rewarding excellent leadership or simply the biggest shock.

However the latest competition is fundamentally unique. The pool of contenders is remarkably strong. It has been the season of resurgences. The league has been chaotic, with reigning conference champions declining and recent also-rans ascending together. In an ordinary season, a coach guiding the his team to the summit of the AFC would make him the stone-cold front-runner. Yet in such a chaotic and thrilling season, he's up against multiple other exceptional candidates.

This is how the hypothetical vote could shake out.

5) Ben Johnson, His Team, Their Record

Coach of the Year voters love quarterbacks. They always have. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. When you transform a quarterback, you're well on your way home.

The Bears' head coach not only corrected his young quarterback; he's unleashed him. Within an ideal environment, the QB has been given the chance to demonstrate his rare ability. From Week 9, the Chicago offense rank number four in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a hot streak – it's consistent excellence. With Johnson, Williams has become increasingly confident, less careless, and has eagerly submitted to the system instead of freelancing. It is an offense designed entirely in the coach's image: a physical ground attack, a heavy dose of play-action and a creative passing attack that springs wide receiver targets all over the field. Williams has taken advantage. And when openings haven't been available, he's been able to conjure magic from broken plays.

The coach arrived to Chicago with a specific offensive vision. Virtually every decision – overhauling the offensive line, featuring the pass-catchers, transforming the QB into a timing-based passer – has paid off. That's rare for a rookie head coach. And it's even more uncommon yet for a coach who walked into the organization with the immense pressure he did. For two straight cycles, he was the most sought-after name on the coaching carousel. However when it comes to selecting a head coach, there are zero sure things. Somehow, he has met expectations – and even surpassed them. He's demonstrated not just to be a scheme genius but the type of leader that can breathe fresh energy into an franchise.

During a ordinary season, he would be the runaway favorite. Yet the current is not a typical campaign!

The area where his case runs slightly unstuck is on the defensive side. The Bears currently rank 25th in defensive success rate. They are relying on takeaways, and takeaways are notoriously unreliable. Coaches can stress ball disruption, but nobody can guarantee it. Johnson is on the list because the offensive production is legitimate. He's ranked lower because variance is doing too much of the defensive heavy lifting. If not for a few bounces of the ball, the team would be two wins behind. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the core is established for sustained winning. But Johnson comes up short here.

4) The Jacksonville Jaguars Coach, His Team, 12-4

Coen is in a similar spot to his counterpart. He's a fellow rookie head coach who has masterminded a rapid turnaround. Over the crucial final weeks of the season, he has his franchise quarterback playing the finest overall football of his career. And he's also spearheaded the transformation of a defense that now sits at number five in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.

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

The coach walked into Jacksonville with an uncommonly inexperienced coaching staff. Unlike other coaches, who surrounded themselves with the ideal coaching blend of youth and veteran savvy, Coen trusted newbies. Starting with the head coach on down to assistants to assistant coaches, the Jags are stocked with first-timers. That kind of approach is intriguing in theory, but often collapses in practice – as past failures are a warning – because everyone is figuring out a their job on the fly. Yet he has pulled everyone and everything into sync.

Following an initial hot start, there was a possibility that the campaign would veer off the track. A midseason collapse caused the team wobbling again. That's typically when coaches overcorrect. He didn't. Rather, he streamlined things. Jacksonville stopped pursuing explosive answers and started hunting consistent ones. Coen refocused the attack around his playmakers and the running game, and asked Lawrence to use his legs more.

The outcomes are obvious. The Jaguars have won seven games consecutively and will be the conference's No 3 playoff seed. He gets the tiniest deduction in the standings because he took over a skilled team, but he has proven he can maximize that talent.

3) The Seattle Seahawks Coach, Seattle Seahawks, Their Record

Every Coach of the Year case has a defining decision. For Mike Macdonald, it was his quarterback choice.

Parting ways from a incumbent, signing a new quarterback and pairing him with an innovative offensive coordinator could have ended the season in October. Instead, it defined it. By the middle point of the year, the new QB was an MVP candidate. He has cooled off since that time, dropping to a lower rank in efficiency per pass attempt over the latter part of the season, placing him just one place ahead of other QBs.

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