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Usually, the NFL's Coach of the Year award follows a simple pattern. It often functions as a form of apology. Sorry we underestimated your squad in our preseason predictions.

On paper, it's a clear-cut line: the skipper who orchestrated the biggest resurgence is handed the prize. In practice, it sparks an annual debate about preseason outlooks and whether we're truly rewarding excellent leadership or simply the biggest shock.

But the current race is fundamentally unique. The list of nominees is exceptionally strong. It has been the year of turnarounds. The league has been chaotic, with recent division champions falling away and longtime underperformers ascending together. In an typical year, a coach guiding the Denver Broncos to the top of the conference would make him the clear front-runner. Yet in such a chaotic and entertaining year, he's up against five other outstanding coaches.

Below is how the hypothetical vote ought to look.

5) Ben Johnson, Chicago Bears, 11-5

Voters for Coach of the Year voters adore quarterbacks. They always have. Sean McVay in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. A third in 2022. If you transform a quarterback, you're halfway to winning the award.

The Bears' head coach hasn't just fixed his young quarterback; he's unleashed him. Given a proper system, the QB has been given the opportunity to display his otherworldly talent. From Week 9, the Chicago offense sit at number four in offensive Expected Points Added per play. That's not a lucky run – it's prolonged performance. Under his guidance, Williams has become more confident, less reckless, and has eagerly surrendered to the system instead of going rogue. It is an offense designed entirely in the coach's image: a bully-ball run game, a consistent dose of play-action and a creative passing attack that frees wide receiver receivers consistently. Williams has thrived. And when easy reads haven't been there, he's been able to conjure magic out of broken plays.

The coach came to the Bears with a clear offensive philosophy. Almost every decision – overhauling the trenches, featuring the tight ends, transforming Williams into a rhythm thrower – has worked. That's uncommon for a first-year skipper. And it's even more uncommon yet for a leader who entered the building with the kind of pressure he did. For consecutive straight offseasons, he was the top name on the coaching carousel. But when it comes to hiring a leader, there are zero guarantees. Remarkably, Johnson has lived up to expectations – and even surpassed them. He's demonstrated not just to be a scheme genius but the type of culture builder that can inject fresh energy into an franchise.

In a typical season, he would be the clear-cut choice. But the current isn't a typical season!

The area where his candidacy runs a bit unstuck is on defense. The Bears currently sit 25th in defensive success rate. They are living on takeaways, and turnovers are famously fickle. Defensive minds can focus on creating turnovers, but nobody can guarantee it. Johnson is on the list because the offense is sustainable. He's ranked lower because variance is doing too much of the defense's work. If not for a few breaks of the ball, the team would be several wins worse off. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the foundation is established for long-term winning. But Johnson comes up just short in this ranking.

4) Liam Coen, His Team, Their Record

Coen is in a comparable spot to Johnson. He's a fellow first-time head coach who has masterminded a swift resurgence. Over the stretch run of the year, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the best all-around football of his professional life. And he's also overseen the overhaul of a defensive unit that now ranks number five in the NFL in EPA per play.

Even more impressively, he has mastered the intangibles stuff, which was not a guarantee after his initial press conference introduction and some of his preseason decisions.

The coach took over the Jaguars with an uncommonly inexperienced coaching staff. In contrast to other coaches, who packed themselves with the perfect staff blend of youth and veteran savvy, Coen trusted first-timers. Starting with the head coach himself to assistants to position coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with first-timers. That type of approach is exciting in theory, but often fails in reality – as past failures are a warning – because everyone is learning a their job on the fly. But he has pulled the entire group and everything into sync.

Following an initial hot start, there was a risk that the season would veer off the rails. A mid-year setback caused the team wobbling again. That's typically when leaders panic and change too much. He did not. Instead, he simplified the approach. Jacksonville stopped chasing explosive answers and started hunting reliable ones. The coach recentered the attack around key players and the running game, and encouraged Lawrence to use his mobility more often.

The results are evident. The Jaguars have won multiple games in a row and will be the AFC's number three seed. Coen gets the tiniest deduction in the rankings because he took over a talented roster, but he has proven he can maximize that talent.

3) The Seattle Seahawks Coach, His Team, Their Record

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

Moving on from a veteran, signing a new signal-caller and partnering him with an new play-caller might have ended the campaign in the early weeks. Rather, it defined it. By the middle point of the year, the new QB was an MVP candidate. He has fallen away since that hot streak, dropping to 23rd in efficiency per dropback over the second half of the schedule, putting him only a single spot ahead of other QBs.

Still