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Ordinarily, the NFL's Coach of the Year honor adheres to a simple formula. It commonly acts as a type of apology. We regret we underestimated your franchise in our preseason predictions.

On paper, it's a clear-cut line: the skipper who engineered the largest turnaround receives the prize. In practice, it fuels an annual discussion about preseason outlooks and whether we're truly rewarding superior leadership or just the biggest surprise.

Yet the latest race is profoundly different. The pool of contenders is exceptionally strong. It has been the campaign of resurgences. The league has been chaotic, with reigning division champions falling away and longtime strugglers improving collectively. During an normal season, a coach guiding the Denver Broncos to the top of the AFC would make him the clear favorite. Yet in this wild and entertaining season, he's up against multiple other exceptional candidates.

This is how the ideal vote ought to look.

5) Ben Johnson, Chicago Bears, 11-5

Voters for Coach of the Year selectors love signal-callers. They always have. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. If you fix a franchise QB, you're well on your way home.

Ben Johnson didn't merely corrected Caleb Williams; he's freed him. Given a proper system, Williams has been given the chance to demonstrate his otherworldly ability. Since midseason onward, the Chicago offense rank number four in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a lucky run – it's sustained dominance. Under Johnson, Williams has become increasingly decisive, far less reckless, and has willingly submitted to the gameplan instead of improvising. It is an offense designed entirely in the coach's image: a physical ground attack, a consistent dose of play-action passes and a imaginative passing attack that creates wide-open receivers consistently. Williams has capitalized. And when easy reads weren't there, he's been able to conjure magic out of nothing.

Johnson arrived to the Bears with a specific offensive vision. Virtually each gamble – overhauling the offensive line, highlighting the pass-catchers, transforming Williams into a timing-based passer – has paid off. This is uncommon for a first-year skipper. And it's rarer yet for a leader who walked into the building with the level of hype Johnson did. For two straight offseasons, he was the top candidate on the coaching carousel. However when it comes to hiring a head coach, there are zero sure things. Somehow, he has lived up to the hype – and even surpassed them. He's proven not just to be a offensive wizard but the type of culture builder that can breathe fresh energy into an franchise.

In a ordinary season, Johnson would be the runaway choice. But this is not a normal campaign!

Where his candidacy runs slightly into trouble is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense presently rank 25th in defensive success rate. They are living on takeaways, and turnovers are famously fickle. Defensive minds can focus on creating turnovers, but no one can ensure it. He is on the ballot because the offensive production is sustainable. He's ranked lower because luck is doing too much of the defensive heavy lifting. If not for a few bounces of the ball, the Bears would be several wins behind. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the foundation is established for long-term success. But Johnson falls just short here.

4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, Their Record

The Jaguars' coach is in a comparable spot to his counterpart. He's another first-time head coach who has masterminded a dramatic resurgence. During the stretch run of the season, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the finest overall football of his professional life. And he's also overseen the remaking of a defensive unit that now ranks number five in the league in EPA per play.

What's more impressively, Coen has excelled at the off-field stuff, which was not a certainty following his initial public appearances and some of his offseason decisions.

The coach walked into Jacksonville with an exceptionally raw staff. Unlike other coaches, who packed themselves with the perfect staff blend of new ideas and veteran savvy, Coen bet on first-timers. Starting with the leader on down to coordinators to position coaches, the Jags are stocked with rookies. That kind of setup is intriguing in theory, but frequently collapses in reality – as past failures are a cautionary tale – because everyone is learning a new job in real-time. Yet Coen has pulled everyone and everything into sync.

Following an early strong start, there was a chance that the campaign would veer off the track. A midseason collapse caused the team stumbling once more. That's usually when coaches panic and change too much. He didn't. Instead, he streamlined the approach. The offense stopped chasing explosive answers and started seeking consistent ones. The coach recentered the attack around his playmakers and the running game, and encouraged his QB to use his legs more often.

The results are evident. The Jags have won multiple games consecutively and will be the conference's No 3 seed. Coen gets the tiniest deduction in the standings because he inherited a talented roster, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that talent.

3) Mike Macdonald, Seattle Seahawks, Their Record

Each Strong of the Year argument has a hinge decision. For the Seahawks coach, it was his quarterback choice.

Parting ways from a incumbent, bringing in a different signal-caller and pairing him with an new offensive coordinator could have ended the season in the early weeks. Rather, it shaped it. By the middle point of the season, the acquisition was an MVP candidate. He has regressed after that hot streak, slipping to a lower rank in efficiency per dropback over the latter part of the schedule, placing him just one place ahead of other QBs.

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