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Ordinarily, the NFL's Head Coach of the Year honor follows a straightforward formula. It frequently functions as a type of mea culpa. Our apologies we got wrong your franchise in our preseason forecasts.

In theory, it's a clear-cut line: the skipper who orchestrated the most dramatic turnaround is handed the prize. In reality, it fuels an annual debate about preseason outlooks and whether we're genuinely rewarding excellent leadership or merely the greatest surprise.

However the current competition is profoundly unique. The pool of candidates is remarkably deep. It has been the campaign of comebacks. The league has been chaotic, with reigning conference champions falling away and recent also-rans rising in unison. Under an normal season, a coach leading the his team to the top of the conference would make him the clear front-runner. Yet in this chaotic and fun season, he's competing with five other outstanding candidates.

This is how the hypothetical ballot should be structured.

5) Ben Johnson, Chicago Bears, Their Record

Coach of the Year voters love signal-callers. They always have. A certain coach in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. If you transform a quarterback, you're halfway to winning the award.

Ben Johnson not only fixed Caleb Williams; he's unleashed him. In the right system, Williams has been given the chance to display his rare talent. Since midseason onward, the Chicago offense rank fourth in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a brief surge – it's sustained excellence. Under his guidance, Williams has become increasingly decisive, far less reckless, and has eagerly surrendered to the system rather than going rogue. It is an attack designed solely in Johnson's image: a bully-ball run game, a steady dose of play-action and a creative aerial game that springs wide-open receivers consistently. Williams has taken advantage. And when openings weren't available, he's been able to spin big plays from broken plays.

The coach arrived to Chicago with a defined offensive blueprint. Almost every bet – overhauling the trenches, highlighting the tight ends, transforming Williams into a timing-based thrower – has succeeded. This is rare for a rookie skipper. And it's rarer yet for a coach who walked into the building with the level of pressure Johnson did. For two straight offseasons, he was the hottest name on the head coaching market. But when it comes to selecting a leader, there are zero guarantees. Remarkably, he has lived up to the hype – and even surpassed them. He's demonstrated not only to be a offensive dork but the type of leader that can inject fresh energy into an franchise.

In a normal year, he would be the clear-cut favorite. But this isn't a typical year!

Where Johnson's case comes a bit unstuck is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense presently sit in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are surviving on turnovers, and takeaways are notoriously inconsistent. Defensive minds can focus on creating turnovers, but no one can guarantee it. He is on the ballot because the offense is real. He's not higher because luck is doing too much of the defense's work. With a couple bounces of the ball, the Bears would be several wins behind. It's been an exceptional turnaround, and the core is established for sustained winning. But Johnson comes up short here.

4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, 12-4

Coen is in a comparable position to his counterpart. He's a fellow rookie head coach who has orchestrated a dramatic resurgence. Over the stretch run of the season, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the best overall ball of his career. And he's also overseen the transformation of a defense that now ranks number five in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.

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

Coen walked into the Jaguars with an exceptionally raw staff. In contrast to Johnson, who surrounded themselves with the ideal coaching mix of youth and experience, he hired newbies. From the leader on down to assistants to position coaches, the Jags are stocked with first-timers. That kind of approach is exciting on paper, but frequently fails in practice – as past failures are a warning – because everybody is figuring out a new job in real-time. Yet he has pulled the entire group and all elements into sync.

After an early strong beginning, there was a risk that the campaign would veer off the track. A midseason collapse caused the team wobbling once more. That's usually when coaches overcorrect. He didn't. Instead, he simplified the approach. Jacksonville stopped chasing explosive plays and started seeking consistent ones. Coen recentered the attack around key players and the ground attack, and encouraged Lawrence to use his legs more often.

The outcomes are evident. The Jaguars have won multiple games consecutively and will be the conference's No 3 seed. He gets the tiniest deduction in the rankings because he inherited a skilled roster, but he has demonstrated he can get the most out of that roster.

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

Each Coach of the Year argument has a defining decision. For the Seahawks coach, it was his QB decision.

Moving on from a veteran, signing a different signal-caller and partnering him with an innovative offensive coordinator could have derailed the campaign in October. Instead, it made it. Through the mid point of the year, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player front-runner. He has regressed after that time, slipping to a lower rank in efficiency per pass attempt over the latter part of the schedule, placing him only a single spot ahead of other QBs.

Still