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Usually, the National Football League's Coach of the Year honor adheres to a simple script. It often functions as a type of apology. Sorry we underestimated your franchise in our preseason projections.

In theory, it's a direct trajectory: the skipper who engineered the biggest resurgence wins the prize. In practice, it fuels an annual debate about expectations and whether we're genuinely rewarding superior coaching or merely the biggest upset.

However the latest field is profoundly different. The pool of contenders is remarkably talented. It has been the season of comebacks. The league has been chaotic, with recent conference champions fading and longtime underperformers rising in unison. Under an typical year, Sean Payton leading the his team to the top of the conference would make him the clear favorite. Yet in such a wild and fun season, he's facing five other exceptional coaches.

Below is how the hypothetical vote should shake out.

5) The Chicago Bears Coach, His Team, 11-5

Voters for Coach of the Year selectors love quarterbacks. History shows this. Sean McVay in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. A third in 2022. Should you solve a franchise QB, 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, the QB has been afforded the opportunity to showcase his rare talent. From Week 9, the Bears rank number four in offensive Expected Points Added per play. This isn't a hot streak – it's sustained performance. With his guidance, Williams has become increasingly confident, less reckless, and has willingly surrendered to the gameplan rather than going rogue. It is an offense designed entirely in Johnson's image: a bully-ball run game, a consistent dose of play-action passes and a imaginative passing attack that springs wide-open receivers all over the field. The QB has capitalized. And when easy reads haven't been available, he's been able to spin magic out of broken plays.

The coach arrived to the Bears with a defined offensive philosophy. Virtually each gamble – overhauling the trenches, utilizing the pass-catchers, transforming the QB into a rhythm passer – has paid off. This is rare for a first-year skipper. And it's even more uncommon still for a leader who entered the organization with the level of hype Johnson did. For two straight offseasons, he was the hottest 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 demonstrated not just to be a scheme wizard but the type of leader that can breathe fresh energy into an organization.

In a normal year, Johnson would be the overwhelming favorite. Yet this is not a normal season!

Where Johnson's candidacy comes a bit unstuck is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense presently rank 25th in defensive success rate. They are surviving on takeaways, and turnovers are famously fickle. Coaches can emphasise ball disruption, but no one can guarantee it. He is on the ballot because the offense is sustainable. He's ranked lower because luck is doing an outsized share of the defense's heavy lifting. With a couple bounces of the ball, the Bears would be two wins worse off. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the foundation is established for sustained winning. However Johnson comes up just short here.

4) Liam Coen, His Team, Their Record

The Jaguars' coach is in a comparable situation to Johnson. He's a fellow rookie leader who has masterminded a swift turnaround. During the stretch run of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the finest all-around ball of his professional life. And he's also spearheaded the remaking of a defense that now sits at number five in the league in Expected Points Added per play.

What's more impressively, Coen has excelled at the leadership aspects, which wasn't a certainty after his initial press conference introduction and some of his preseason moves.

The coach took over Jacksonville with an uncommonly raw coaching staff. In contrast to other coaches, who surrounded their staff with the perfect coaching blend of new ideas and experience, he bet on newbies. From the head coach himself to assistants to position coaches, the Jags are filled with rookies. That type of approach is intriguing on paper, but frequently fails in reality – as past failures are a warning – because everybody is figuring out a new job in real-time. But Coen has managed to bring everyone and all elements together.

Following an initial hot beginning, there was a chance that the season would go off the track. A mid-year setback caused the Jags stumbling once more. That's usually when coaches overcorrect. Coen did not. Instead, he simplified things. Jacksonville stopped chasing home-run answers and started hunting reliable ones. Coen recentered the offense around his playmakers and the ground attack, and encouraged his QB to use his mobility more.

The outcomes are obvious. The Jags have won multiple games in a row and will be the AFC's number three playoff seed. He gets the slightest knock in the standings because he took over a talented team, but he has proven he can maximize that talent.

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

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

Moving on from a incumbent, signing a new signal-caller and pairing him with an innovative play-caller might have ended the campaign in the early weeks. Rather, it defined it. By the mid point of the season, the new QB was an MVP candidate. He has cooled off since that time, slipping to a lower rank in EPA per dropback over the second half of the schedule, placing him only one place ahead of peers.

Still