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Typically, the NFL's Coach of the Year award adheres to a simple script. It frequently serves as a type of apology. Sorry we underestimated your team in our preseason predictions.

On paper, it's a direct path: the coach who engineered the largest turnaround receives the prize. In practice, it creates an annual debate about preseason outlooks and whether we're genuinely honoring superior leadership or merely the greatest shock.

But the latest race is fundamentally unique. The pool of candidates is unusually strong. It has been the campaign of comebacks. The NFL has been messy, with recent division champions declining and longtime underperformers improving in unison. Under an normal year, a coach guiding the his team to the top of the AFC would make him the overwhelming front-runner. But in this chaotic and thrilling year, he's facing several other exceptional candidates.

Here is how the hypothetical ballot should shake out.

5) Ben Johnson, Chicago Bears, Their Record

Coach of the Year voters love QBs. This is a tradition. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. When you fix a quarterback, you're well on your way home.

The Bears' head coach didn't merely corrected Caleb Williams; he's unleashed him. Within an ideal environment, Williams has been afforded the chance to demonstrate his rare talent. From Week 9, the Bears rank fourth in offensive Expected Points Added per play. That's not a brief surge – it's consistent dominance. With his guidance, the quarterback has become increasingly confident, less careless, and has willingly surrendered to the system instead of improvising. It is an offense constructed entirely in the coach's vision: a bully-ball ground attack, a consistent helping of play-action passes and a imaginative aerial game that springs wide-open receivers consistently. Williams has capitalized. And when easy reads haven't been there, he's been capable to spin big plays from nothing.

Johnson came to the Bears with a specific offensive blueprint. Almost each bet – rebuilding the offensive line, highlighting the tight ends, turning Williams into a rhythm passer – has worked. That's uncommon for a first-year skipper. And it's even more uncommon still for a coach who entered the organization with the immense expectations he did. For consecutive straight offseasons, he was the hottest candidate on the coaching market. But when it comes to selecting a leader, there are zero sure things. Somehow, he has met expectations – and even surpassed them. He's proven not only to be a scheme wizard but the type of leader that can inject fresh energy into an organization.

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

The area where Johnson's case runs slightly into trouble is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense presently rank 25th in defensive efficiency. They are relying on takeaways, and turnovers are notoriously unreliable. Coaches can focus on ball disruption, but no one can guarantee it. Johnson is on the ballot because the offensive production is sustainable. He's ranked lower because luck is doing too much of the defensive heavy lifting. If not for a couple bounces of the ball, the Bears would be two wins behind. It's been an exceptional transformation, and the core is established for long-term success. But he comes up short here.

4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, Their Record

Coen is in a comparable position to Johnson. He's a fellow rookie leader who has orchestrated a swift turnaround. Over the crucial final weeks of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the best all-around ball of his career. And he's also overseen the remaking of a defense that now sits at fifth in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.

Even more notably, Coen has excelled at the intangibles aspects, which was not a certainty after his initial press conference introduction and some of his preseason decisions.

The coach walked into Jacksonville with an exceptionally raw coaching staff. In contrast to Johnson, who surrounded themselves with the ideal staff blend of new ideas and experience, Coen bet on newbies. From the head coach himself to coordinators to position coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with rookies. That type of approach is intriguing on paper, but frequently collapses in practice – with other teams are a cautionary tale – because everybody is figuring out a their job on the fly. But he has pulled everyone and all elements together.

Following an initial strong beginning, there was a risk that the season would veer off the rails. A midseason setback had the Jags stumbling once more. That's usually when leaders panic and change too much. He didn't. Rather, he streamlined the approach. Jacksonville stopped chasing home-run answers and started hunting sustainable ones. The coach recentered the offense around his playmakers and the ground attack, and asked his QB to use his legs more often.

The outcomes are clear. The Jaguars have won multiple games in a row and will be the AFC's number three playoff seed. He receives the slightest knock in the rankings because he took over a talented team, but he has proven he can get the most out of that talent.

3) Mike Macdonald, His Team, Their Record

Every Strong of the Year case has a pivotal decision. For the Seahawks coach, it was his QB decision.

Parting ways from a veteran, signing a new quarterback and partnering him with an new play-caller might have derailed the campaign in the early weeks. Rather, it made it. Through the middle point of the year, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player front-runner. He has regressed since that hot streak, dropping to a lower rank in efficiency per dropback over the latter part of the schedule, putting him just one place ahead of peers.

Still