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Ordinarily, the NFL's Head Coach of the Year honor follows a simple script. It frequently functions as a kind of mea culpa. Our apologies we misjudged your franchise in our pre-campaign forecasts.

On paper, it's a clear-cut path: the skipper who oversaw the largest resurgence is handed the award. In reality, it fuels an annual argument about expectations and whether we're truly honoring excellent coaching or merely the biggest surprise.

But the latest race is distinctly unique. The list of candidates is remarkably deep. It has been the campaign of turnarounds. The NFL has been messy, with recent division winners declining and longtime underperformers rising in unison. In an typical year, Sean Payton guiding the Denver Broncos to the summit of the conference would make him the overwhelming favorite. But in this turbulent and fun year, he's competing with multiple other elite candidates.

This is how the hypothetical ballot ought to look.

5) The Chicago Bears Coach, His Team, 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. When you fix a franchise QB, you're halfway home.

Ben Johnson not only corrected his young quarterback; he's unlocked him. In the right ecosystem, Williams has been afforded the chance to demonstrate his rare talent. Since midseason onward, the Chicago offense rank number four in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a hot streak – it's consistent performance. Under Johnson, the quarterback has become more decisive, far less careless, and has willingly surrendered to the gameplan instead of improvising. It is an attack designed solely in Johnson's image: a physical run game, a steady helping of play-action and a innovative aerial game that frees wide-open targets consistently. Williams has thrived. And when clear throws weren't there, he's been capable to spin magic from nothing.

The coach came to Chicago with a defined offensive philosophy. Almost each bet – overhauling the offensive line, highlighting the tight ends, transforming Williams into a rhythm thrower – has worked. That's rare for a rookie head coach. And it's even more uncommon still for a leader who entered the organization with the level of hype he did. For consecutive straight offseasons, he was the most sought-after candidate on the head coaching market. However when it comes to selecting a head coach, there are no guarantees. Somehow, Johnson has lived up to the hype – and even surpassed them. He's proven not just to be a offensive dork but the kind of leader that can breathe new life into an franchise.

During a normal year, Johnson would be the runaway choice. Yet this is not a typical campaign!

The area where his candidacy comes slightly into trouble is on defense. The Chicago defense presently sit 25th in defensive efficiency. They are living on turnovers, and turnovers are notoriously inconsistent. Coaches can emphasise creating turnovers, but nobody can guarantee it. He is on the ballot because the offensive production is legitimate. He's ranked lower because variance is doing an outsized share of the defensive work. If not for a few breaks of the ball, the Bears would be several wins behind. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the foundation is in place for long-term winning. But Johnson comes up short in this ranking.

4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, Their Record

Coen is in a similar situation to Johnson. He's another rookie head coach who has orchestrated a dramatic turnaround. Over the crucial final weeks of the season, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the most complete 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 league in EPA per play.

What's more impressively, Coen has excelled at the intangibles aspects, which wasn't a given following his initial public appearances and some of his offseason decisions.

Coen walked into the Jaguars with an exceptionally raw coaching staff. In contrast to other coaches, who packed their staff with the ideal staff blend of new ideas and experience, he trusted first-timers. From the head coach himself to coordinators to assistant coaches, the Jags are stocked with rookies. That kind of approach is intriguing in theory, but often fails in reality – as past failures are a warning – because everyone is learning a their job on the fly. Yet he has managed to bring everyone and all elements into sync.

After an early strong start, there was a chance that the campaign would go off the rails. A midseason setback had the team stumbling once more. That's usually when leaders overcorrect. Coen didn't. Instead, he simplified things. The offense stopped pursuing explosive plays and started seeking sustainable ones. Coen refocused the attack around his playmakers and the ground attack, and encouraged his QB to use his mobility more often.

The results are clear. The Jags have won multiple games consecutively and will be the conference's No 3 seed. He gets the slightest knock in the standings because he took over a talented team, but he has demonstrated he can get the most out of that roster.

3) Mike Macdonald, Seattle Seahawks, 13-3

Each Strong of the Year case has a hinge decision. For Mike Macdonald, it was his quarterback move.

Moving on from a incumbent, bringing in a new quarterback and pairing him with an new offensive coordinator could have ended the season in October. Rather, it shaped it. By the mid point of the year, the new QB was an Most Valuable Player candidate. He has fallen away since that hot streak, slipping to 23rd in EPA per dropback over the second half of the schedule, placing him only a single spot ahead of other QBs.

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