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Usually, the National Football League's Coach of the Year honor adheres to a straightforward script. It commonly acts as a kind of mea culpa. Our apologies we underestimated your franchise in our preseason predictions.

Theoretically, it's a clear-cut path: the coach who orchestrated the biggest turnaround wins the award. In reality, it sparks an yearly debate about preseason outlooks and whether we're actually rewarding superior leadership or merely the most shocking upset.

However the latest competition is fundamentally unique. The list of candidates is remarkably deep. It has been the campaign of comebacks. The NFL has been messy, with recent division winners declining and longtime also-rans improving together. During an typical season, a coach guiding the his team to the summit of the conference would make him the overwhelming favorite. But in this chaotic and thrilling season, he's facing several other elite coaches.

Below is how the projected vote should be structured.

5) The Chicago Bears Coach, His Team, Their Record

Coach of the Year selectors are fascinated by quarterbacks. History shows this. Sean McVay in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. A third in 2022. If you fix a franchise QB, you're well on your way to winning the award.

The Bears' head coach not only corrected Caleb Williams; he's unlocked him. In the right system, the QB has been afforded the opportunity to showcase his rare talent. Since Week 9, the Bears sit at number four in offensive EPA per play. That's not a lucky run – it's consistent excellence. Under his guidance, the quarterback has become more decisive, less reckless, and has willingly surrendered to the system instead of going rogue. It is an offense constructed solely in Johnson's vision: a bully-ball run game, a consistent helping of play-action passes and a innovative passing attack that creates wide-open receivers all over the field. The QB has thrived. And when openings haven't been there, he's been capable to create magic out of nothing.

Johnson came to Chicago with a clear offensive vision. Virtually each bet – overhauling the trenches, featuring the tight ends, turning Williams into a rhythm passer – has worked. This is uncommon for a first-year skipper. And it's rarer yet for a coach who entered the building with the immense expectations Johnson did. For consecutive straight offseasons, he was the hottest candidate on the coaching market. But when it comes to hiring a leader, there are no guarantees. Somehow, he has lived up to the hype – and even exceeded them. He's demonstrated not only to be a scheme wizard but the type of leader that can inject fresh energy into an organization.

In a typical year, he would be the clear-cut choice. Yet this is not a normal season!

Where his case comes a bit unstuck is on defense. The Bears presently rank 25th in defensive success rate. They are living on takeaways, and takeaways are notoriously fickle. Coaches can stress ball disruption, but no one can ensure it. He is on the list because the offense is legitimate. He's ranked lower because variance is doing an outsized share of the defensive work. If not for a couple bounces of the ball, the team would be several wins behind. It's been an exceptional turnaround, and the foundation is in place for sustained success. But Johnson falls short in this ranking.

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

Coen is in a comparable situation to Johnson. He's a fellow rookie head coach who has orchestrated a swift turnaround. During the crucial final weeks of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the finest all-around football of his career. And he's also spearheaded the transformation of a defensive unit that now sits at number five in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.

Even more impressively, he has mastered the off-field aspects, which wasn't a given after his initial press conference introduction and some of his offseason moves.

Coen walked into the Jaguars with an exceptionally raw staff. Unlike Johnson, who surrounded their staff with the ideal staff blend of youth and experience, he bet on first-timers. Starting with the head coach on down to coordinators to position coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with rookies. That kind of approach is exciting on paper, but frequently collapses in reality – with other teams are a cautionary tale – because everyone is learning a their job in real-time. But Coen has pulled everyone and all elements into sync.

After an early hot beginning, there was a risk that the campaign would go off the track. A mid-year collapse had the team wobbling once more. That's usually when coaches panic and change too much. He didn't. Instead, he simplified the approach. The offense stopped chasing home-run plays and started seeking consistent ones. The coach refocused the attack around key players and the running game, and asked his QB to use his mobility more.

The results are clear. The Jaguars have won multiple games consecutively and will be the conference's number three seed. Coen receives the tiniest deduction in the standings because he inherited a skilled roster, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that roster.

3) Mike Macdonald, His Team, Their Record

Every Strong of the Year narrative has a hinge moment. For the Seahawks coach, it was his quarterback choice.

Parting ways from a incumbent, bringing in a new signal-caller and pairing him with an innovative play-caller might have ended the season in the early weeks. Rather, it made it. Through the middle point of the season, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player front-runner. He has cooled off after that hot streak, dropping to 23rd in efficiency per dropback over the latter part of the season, placing him just a single place ahead of other QBs.

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