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Usually, the National Football League's Head Coach of the Year honor follows a straightforward pattern. It commonly acts as a kind of mea culpa. We regret we underestimated your squad in our preseason predictions.

Theoretically, it's a direct path: the coach who oversaw the most dramatic resurgence receives the prize. However, it creates an yearly discussion about expectations and whether we're genuinely honoring superior leadership or just the biggest upset.

Yet the current field is fundamentally unique. The group of nominees is unusually talented. It has been the campaign of comebacks. The league has been messy, with reigning division champions fading and recent strugglers rising together. During an typical season, Sean Payton guiding the his team to the summit of the AFC would make him the clear front-runner. But in such a wild and thrilling year, he's competing with multiple other elite candidates.

Below is how the hypothetical ballot ought to shake out.

5) The Chicago Bears Coach, His Team, 11-5

Coach of the Year selectors adore QBs. History shows this. A certain coach in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. If you fix a franchise QB, you're halfway to winning the award.

Ben Johnson not only corrected Caleb Williams; he's freed him. In the right ecosystem, the QB has been afforded the opportunity to demonstrate his otherworldly ability. Since midseason onward, the Bears rank fourth in offensive EPA per play. That's not a hot streak – it's sustained performance. Under Johnson, Williams has become increasingly confident, far less careless, and has eagerly surrendered to the system rather than going rogue. It is an attack built solely in the coach's image: a bully-ball ground attack, a heavy dose of play-action passes and a creative passing attack that springs wide receiver targets consistently. Williams has thrived. And when easy reads haven't been there, he's been capable to create big plays out of broken plays.

The coach came to the Bears with a clear offensive blueprint. Virtually each decision – rebuilding the trenches, utilizing the pass-catchers, turning Williams into a rhythm thrower – has succeeded. This is uncommon for a rookie head coach. And it's rarer yet for a leader who walked into the organization with the level of pressure Johnson did. For two straight cycles, he was the hottest candidate on the coaching carousel. But when it comes to hiring a leader, there are no guarantees. Remarkably, he has lived up to expectations – and even exceeded them. He's proven not just to be a scheme wizard but the kind of culture builder that can inject fresh energy into an franchise.

In a ordinary season, Johnson would be the runaway favorite. Yet this isn't a normal season!

The area where his case runs slightly unstuck is on the defensive side. The Bears currently sit in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are surviving on takeaways, and turnovers are notoriously unreliable. Coaches can emphasise ball disruption, but no one can ensure it. Johnson is on the list because the offensive production is legitimate. He's not higher because variance is doing an outsized share of the defensive heavy lifting. If not for a couple bounces of the ball, the team would be two victories worse off. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the core is established for long-term success. However he comes up just short in this ranking.

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

Coen is in a comparable spot to Johnson. He's another first-time leader who has engineered a rapid resurgence. Over the crucial final weeks of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the best overall ball of his professional life. And he's also spearheaded the transformation of a defense that now sits at number five in the league in EPA per play.

What's more notably, Coen has nailed the off-field stuff, which was not a given after his initial public appearances and some of his offseason decisions.

Coen took over Jacksonville with an uncommonly inexperienced staff. Unlike other coaches, who surrounded themselves with the perfect staff mix of new ideas and veteran savvy, Coen hired newbies. Starting with the leader on down to coordinators to position coaches, the Jags are stocked with rookies. That kind of approach is intriguing in theory, but often collapses in practice – with other teams are a warning – because everybody is figuring out a their job on the fly. But Coen has pulled the entire group and everything together.

Following an early strong beginning, there was a possibility that the campaign would go off the track. A midseason collapse caused the team wobbling again. That's usually when coaches panic and change too much. Coen didn't. Rather, he simplified the approach. Jacksonville stopped chasing explosive plays and started seeking consistent ones. Coen recentered the offense around key players and the running game, and encouraged Lawrence to use his mobility more.

The results are obvious. The Jaguars have won seven games in a row and will be the AFC's number three playoff seed. He receives the tiniest deduction in the standings because he inherited a talented team, but he has demonstrated he can get the most out of that talent.

3) Mike Macdonald, His Team, Their Record

Each Strong of the Year narrative has a hinge decision. For the Seahawks coach, it was his QB move.

Moving on from a veteran, bringing in a new signal-caller and partnering him with an innovative play-caller might have derailed the season in October. Instead, it made it. Through the middle point of the year, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player front-runner. He has cooled off since that hot streak, dropping to 23rd in efficiency per dropback over the second half of the schedule, placing him just a single spot ahead of peers.

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