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Ordinarily, the NFL's Coach of the Year award follows a straightforward formula. It frequently functions as a kind of apology. Sorry we got wrong your franchise in our pre-campaign predictions.

In theory, it's a direct path: the coach who orchestrated the largest resurgence wins the award. In practice, it sparks an annual argument about preseason outlooks and whether we're genuinely honoring superior coaching or merely the biggest surprise.

However the latest race is profoundly unique. The group of contenders is unusually strong. It has been the season of comebacks. The NFL has been messy, with reigning conference champions fading and recent also-rans improving in unison. Under an ordinary year, Sean Payton leading the his team to the top of the conference would make him the stone-cold favorite. But in such a chaotic and entertaining year, he's facing multiple other outstanding candidates.

Below is how the ideal ballot ought to be structured.

5) Ben Johnson, Chicago Bears, Their Record

Voters for Coach of the Year voters love QBs. History shows this. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. If you transform a franchise QB, you're halfway home.

The Bears' head coach didn't merely fixed Caleb Williams; he's unleashed him. Within an ideal system, the QB has been afforded the opportunity to display his rare ability. From Week 9, the Bears sit at number four in offensive Expected Points Added per play. That's not a brief surge – it's consistent performance. With his guidance, the quarterback has become increasingly decisive, far less reckless, and has eagerly surrendered to the system instead of freelancing. It is an attack constructed entirely in the coach's vision: a physical ground attack, a consistent helping of play-action passes and a innovative aerial game that springs wide-open targets everywhere. The QB has capitalized. And when easy reads haven't been available, he's been able to conjure big plays from nothing.

Johnson arrived to Chicago with a specific offensive vision. Virtually every decision – rebuilding the trenches, featuring the tight ends, turning the QB into a rhythm passer – has worked. This is uncommon for a first-year skipper. And it's rarer still for a leader who walked into the building with the level of expectations he did. For two straight cycles, he was the most sought-after name on the head coaching market. However when it comes to selecting a head coach, there are zero guarantees. Somehow, he has lived up to the hype – and even exceeded them. He's proven not just to be a scheme genius but the kind of leader that can inject new life into an organization.

In a typical season, Johnson would be the runaway favorite. But the current isn't a normal campaign!

The area where his case comes a bit unstuck is on defense. The Bears currently sit in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are living on takeaways, and turnovers are famously fickle. Coaches can stress creating turnovers, but no one can guarantee it. He is on the list because the offensive production is sustainable. He's not higher because variance is doing too much of the defensive work. With a few breaks of the ball, the Bears would be several victories behind. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the foundation is established for long-term success. However he comes up just short here.

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

The Jaguars' coach is in a similar situation to Johnson. He's another rookie leader who has orchestrated a swift resurgence. Over the crucial final weeks of the season, he has his franchise quarterback playing the best overall ball of his career. And he's also overseen the transformation of a defense that now ranks fifth in the NFL in EPA per play.

Even more notably, Coen has nailed the off-field stuff, which wasn't a guarantee following his initial press conference introduction and some of his offseason decisions.

The coach took over Jacksonville with an exceptionally raw staff. Unlike other coaches, who packed themselves with the ideal staff blend of youth and veteran savvy, he trusted first-timers. Starting with the head coach himself to assistants to assistant coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with first-timers. That kind of setup is intriguing on paper, but often collapses in reality – with other teams are a cautionary tale – because everyone is figuring out a their job in real-time. Yet Coen has managed to bring the entire group and all elements into sync.

Following an initial hot beginning, there was a possibility that the season would veer off the rails. A mid-year collapse caused the team wobbling again. That's typically when leaders overcorrect. He did not. Instead, he simplified things. Jacksonville stopped chasing home-run plays and started hunting reliable ones. Coen refocused the attack around key players and the running game, and encouraged Lawrence to use his legs more.

The results are obvious. The Jaguars have won multiple games in a row and will be the conference's No 3 seed. He receives the tiniest knock in the rankings because he inherited a talented team, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that roster.

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

Each Coach of the Year narrative has a pivotal decision. For the Seahawks coach, it was his QB choice.

Moving on from a veteran, bringing in a different quarterback and partnering him with an innovative play-caller might have derailed the campaign in the early weeks. Instead, it made it. By the middle point of the season, the new QB was an Most Valuable Player candidate. He has regressed since that hot streak, dropping to 23rd in EPA per dropback over the second half of the schedule, placing him just a single place ahead of peers.

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