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Typically, the National Football League's Head Coach of the Year honor adheres to a straightforward script. It often acts as a kind of mea culpa. Sorry we misjudged your squad in our pre-campaign predictions.

On paper, it's a clear-cut line: the coach who oversaw the largest improvement wins the prize. In reality, it fuels an annual discussion about expectations and whether we're truly honoring excellent coaching or simply the biggest surprise.

However the current field is profoundly unique. The group of candidates is unusually talented. It has been the year of comebacks. The league has been chaotic, with reigning conference champions fading and recent underperformers ascending in unison. During an normal year, a coach guiding the his team to the top of the AFC would make him the overwhelming front-runner. Yet in such a turbulent and thrilling season, he's competing with multiple other elite candidates.

This is how the hypothetical vote should look.

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

Voters for Coach of the Year voters adore QBs. They always have. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. When you transform a quarterback, you're well on your way to winning the award.

Ben Johnson hasn't just fixed Caleb Williams; he's freed him. In the right ecosystem, Williams has been given the chance to display his rare ability. From Week 9, the Bears rank number four in offensive EPA per play. That's not a brief surge – it's consistent excellence. With his guidance, the quarterback has become increasingly confident, far less careless, and has eagerly submitted to the system rather than going rogue. It is an offense designed entirely in the coach's image: a bully-ball ground attack, a heavy dose of play-action and a innovative passing attack that springs wide-open receivers consistently. Williams has capitalized. And when clear throws haven't been there, he's been capable to conjure magic from nothing.

The coach arrived to Chicago with a defined offensive blueprint. Almost every bet – overhauling the offensive line, featuring the pass-catchers, transforming the QB into a timing-based thrower – has worked. This is uncommon for a rookie head coach. And it's rarer yet for a leader who entered the organization with the level of hype he did. For two straight offseasons, he was the top name on the coaching market. But when it comes to selecting a head coach, there are no sure things. Somehow, Johnson has lived up to expectations – and even exceeded them. He's proven not only to be a offensive wizard but the type of leader that can breathe new life into an organization.

In a ordinary season, Johnson would be the clear-cut favorite. Yet this isn't a typical campaign!

Where his case runs a bit unstuck is on defense. The Bears presently sit 25th in defensive efficiency. They are relying on takeaways, and takeaways are famously inconsistent. Defensive minds can focus on ball disruption, but no one can guarantee it. Johnson is on the ballot because the offense is sustainable. He's ranked lower because luck is doing too much of the defense's heavy lifting. With a few bounces of the ball, the Bears would be several victories worse off. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the foundation is in place for sustained winning. However Johnson falls just short here.

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

The Jaguars' coach is in a comparable situation to his counterpart. He's another rookie head coach who has masterminded a dramatic resurgence. Over the crucial final weeks of the season, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the finest all-around ball of his career. And he's also overseen the overhaul of a defense that now sits at fifth in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.

What's more impressively, he has excelled at the leadership aspects, which wasn't a guarantee after his early press conference introduction and some of his offseason moves.

Coen walked into Jacksonville with an exceptionally inexperienced coaching staff. In contrast to other coaches, who packed themselves with the ideal staff cocktail of youth and veteran savvy, Coen bet on newbies. From the leader on down to assistants to assistant coaches, the Jags are stocked with rookies. That type of setup is intriguing in theory, but often collapses in reality – as past failures are a cautionary tale – because everybody is learning a their job on the fly. But he has managed to bring everyone and everything into sync.

After an initial strong start, there was a chance that the season would veer off the track. A midseason setback caused the team wobbling once more. That's typically when coaches panic and change too much. Coen did not. Instead, he streamlined things. Jacksonville stopped chasing explosive answers and started hunting consistent ones. Coen recentered the attack around his playmakers and the ground attack, and asked Lawrence to use his mobility more.

The results are clear. The Jags have won seven games consecutively and will be the AFC's number three seed. Coen gets the slightest deduction in the rankings because he inherited a skilled team, but he has proven he can get the most out of that roster.

3) Mike Macdonald, His Team, Their Record

Each Coach of the Year case has a hinge decision. For the Seahawks coach, it was his QB decision.

Parting ways from a incumbent, bringing in a new signal-caller and partnering him with an new play-caller might have derailed the campaign in the early weeks. Instead, it shaped it. By the mid point of the year, the new QB was an MVP candidate. He has regressed after that hot streak, dropping to a lower rank in EPA per pass attempt over the second half of the schedule, placing him just a single place ahead of other QBs.

Still