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Typically, the NFL's Head Coach of the Year trophy follows a straightforward pattern. It frequently serves as a kind of mea culpa. We regret we misjudged your team in our preseason forecasts.

On paper, it's a direct line: the coach who orchestrated the largest resurgence receives the award. In practice, it sparks an annual discussion about expectations and whether we're truly honoring excellent leadership or just the most shocking shock.

Yet the current competition is fundamentally unique. The list of candidates is unusually talented. It has been the year of comebacks. The league has been unpredictable, with recent conference winners fading and recent also-rans rising in unison. During an typical year, a coach guiding the his team to the summit of the conference would make him the clear favorite. Yet in such a wild and thrilling season, he's facing several other outstanding coaches.

This is how the ideal vote should be structured.

5) Ben Johnson, His Team, 11-5

Coach of the Year selectors are fascinated by signal-callers. History shows this. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. Should you transform a quarterback, you're well on your way to winning the award.

Ben Johnson hasn't just corrected his young quarterback; he's freed him. Given a proper ecosystem, Williams has been given the chance to showcase his rare ability. Since midseason onward, the Chicago offense rank number four in offensive Expected Points Added per play. This isn't a brief surge – it's prolonged performance. Under Johnson, the quarterback has become more decisive, far less careless, and has willingly submitted to the scheme instead of improvising. It is an offense built solely in the coach's vision: a physical run game, a consistent helping of play-action passes and a creative passing attack that creates wide receiver targets consistently. Williams has taken advantage. And when clear throws haven't been available, he's been able to conjure big plays out of broken plays.

Johnson came to the Bears with a specific offensive philosophy. Almost each bet – overhauling the offensive line, highlighting the tight ends, transforming Williams into a rhythm thrower – has succeeded. This is rare for a first-year head coach. And it's rarer yet for a coach who walked into the building with the immense pressure he did. For consecutive straight offseasons, he was the most sought-after name on the head coaching market. However when it comes to hiring a head coach, there are zero guarantees. Remarkably, he has met expectations – and even exceeded them. He's demonstrated not just to be a scheme wizard but the kind of leader that can breathe fresh energy into an organization.

In a typical season, he would be the runaway favorite. But this is not a normal campaign!

The area where Johnson's candidacy comes a bit into trouble is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense currently sit in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are living on takeaways, and turnovers are notoriously inconsistent. Coaches can focus on creating turnovers, but nobody can guarantee it. He is on the ballot because the offensive production is real. He's not higher because luck is doing too much of the defensive heavy lifting. With a few breaks of the ball, the team would be several wins worse off. It's been an exceptional transformation, and the core is established for long-term success. But Johnson falls just short here.

4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, Their Record

Coen is in a similar spot to Johnson. He's a fellow rookie head coach who has orchestrated a dramatic resurgence. Over the crucial final weeks of the season, he has his franchise quarterback playing the most complete overall ball of his professional life. And he's also overseen the transformation of a defense that now sits at number five in the NFL in EPA per play.

What's more impressively, he has mastered the off-field stuff, which wasn't a guarantee following his early press conference appearances and some of his preseason decisions.

The coach took over the Jaguars with an uncommonly inexperienced staff. In contrast to other coaches, who packed their staff with the perfect staff cocktail of new ideas and veteran savvy, he trusted first-timers. From the head coach on down to coordinators to position coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with rookies. That type of setup is intriguing on paper, but frequently collapses in practice – with other teams are a cautionary tale – because everyone is figuring out a new job in real-time. But he has pulled the entire group and all elements together.

After an initial strong beginning, there was a risk that the season would veer off the track. A midseason setback caused the Jags wobbling once more. That's typically when leaders panic and change too much. He did not. Instead, he streamlined things. The offense stopped pursuing home-run plays and started seeking consistent ones. Coen recentered the offense around key players and the running game, and encouraged Lawrence to use his legs more often.

The results are evident. The Jaguars have won seven games consecutively and will be the AFC's number three seed. Coen gets the slightest knock in the rankings because he took over a talented team, but he has proven he can get the most out of that talent.

3) Mike Macdonald, Seattle Seahawks, Their Record

Each Coach of the Year argument has a pivotal moment. For the Seahawks coach, it was his QB move.

Moving on from a veteran, bringing in a different quarterback and pairing him with an innovative offensive coordinator could have derailed the campaign in October. Instead, it defined it. Through the mid point of the season, the acquisition was an MVP candidate. He has regressed after that hot streak, slipping to a lower rank in EPA per dropback over the latter part of the schedule, putting him only a single place ahead of peers.

Still