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Ordinarily, the National Football League's Coach of the Year honor follows a straightforward script. It frequently serves as a type of apology. Our apologies we got wrong your team in our pre-campaign predictions.

On paper, it's a clear-cut trajectory: the skipper who orchestrated the most dramatic turnaround wins the prize. In reality, it creates an annual debate about preseason outlooks and whether we're genuinely honoring superior coaching or merely the greatest surprise.

But this year's competition is distinctly unique. The group of nominees is exceptionally deep. It has been the year of comebacks. The NFL has been messy, with recent division winners falling away and longtime underperformers improving collectively. During an normal year, a coach guiding the his team to the top of the conference would make him the clear front-runner. But in this turbulent and thrilling year, he's up against multiple other elite coaches.

This is how the projected vote should be structured.

5) Ben Johnson, Chicago Bears, 11-5

Voters for Coach of the Year selectors are fascinated by quarterbacks. History shows this. Sean McVay in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. Should you solve a quarterback, you're halfway to winning the award.

The Bears' head coach hasn't just fixed Caleb Williams; he's unlocked him. Given a proper ecosystem, the QB has been given the chance to showcase his rare talent. Since midseason onward, the Bears rank fourth in offensive EPA per play. That's not a brief surge – it's prolonged performance. With his guidance, the quarterback has become increasingly confident, far less careless, and has willingly surrendered to the system rather than improvising. It is an offense constructed solely in Johnson's image: a physical ground attack, a consistent dose of play-action passes and a creative aerial game that springs wide-open receivers consistently. Williams has taken advantage. And when easy reads weren't there, he's been able to create magic from broken plays.

The coach came to the Bears with a clear offensive vision. Virtually each decision – overhauling the trenches, utilizing the pass-catchers, turning Williams into a timing-based passer – has worked. This is uncommon for a first-year head coach. And it's even more uncommon still for a leader who entered the building with the level of expectations Johnson did. For two straight offseasons, he was the most sought-after candidate on the coaching market. However when it comes to hiring a head coach, there are zero sure things. Remarkably, Johnson has met expectations – and even exceeded them. He's proven not only to be a offensive dork but the type of leader that can inject new life into an organization.

During a normal season, Johnson would be the runaway favorite. Yet the current isn't a normal year!

Where his candidacy runs a bit into trouble is on defense. The Bears currently sit 25th in defensive efficiency. They are living on turnovers, and takeaways are notoriously unreliable. Defensive minds can stress creating turnovers, but no one can ensure it. Johnson is on the ballot because the offense is sustainable. He's not higher because variance is doing an outsized share of the defense's heavy lifting. If not for a few breaks of the ball, the team would be several victories behind. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the foundation is in place for sustained winning. However he comes up just short in this ranking.

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

The Jaguars' coach is in a similar situation to his counterpart. He's a fellow first-time leader who has masterminded a rapid turnaround. Over the crucial final weeks of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the most complete overall ball of his career. And he's also spearheaded the remaking of a defense that now sits at fifth in the league in Expected Points Added per play.

Even more notably, he has nailed the off-field stuff, which was not a given following his early public introduction and some of his preseason moves.

The coach walked into Jacksonville with an uncommonly raw coaching staff. In contrast to Johnson, who surrounded their staff with the ideal staff cocktail of new ideas and veteran savvy, Coen trusted first-timers. From the head coach on down to coordinators to assistant coaches, the Jaguars are filled with rookies. That kind of approach is exciting on paper, but often fails in reality – with other teams are a warning – because everyone is figuring out a their job in real-time. But he has pulled everyone and everything together.

Following an early hot start, there was a possibility that the campaign would go off the track. A mid-year collapse caused the Jags wobbling again. That's usually when coaches overcorrect. He did not. Rather, he streamlined things. Jacksonville stopped chasing home-run plays and started hunting consistent ones. Coen recentered the attack around key players and the running game, and asked his QB to use his mobility more often.

The outcomes are obvious. The Jags have won seven games consecutively and will be the AFC's No 3 seed. Coen receives the slightest deduction in the standings because he inherited a talented roster, but he has proven he can get the most out of that talent.

3) The Seattle Seahawks Coach, Seattle Seahawks, 13-3

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

Parting ways from a incumbent, bringing in a different quarterback and partnering him with an innovative play-caller could have derailed the campaign in the early weeks. Instead, it shaped it. By the mid point of the year, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player front-runner. He has cooled off since that time, dropping to a lower rank in EPA per pass attempt over the second half of the season, putting him just a single spot ahead of peers.

Still