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Usually, the NFL's Head Coach of the Year trophy adheres to a simple script. It frequently serves as a type of mea culpa. Sorry we got wrong your squad in our pre-campaign predictions.

Theoretically, it's a direct line: the coach who orchestrated the largest turnaround is handed the award. In reality, it fuels an annual discussion about preseason outlooks and whether we're truly rewarding superior leadership or simply the greatest surprise.

Yet this year's race is fundamentally unique. The group of contenders is unusually talented. It has been the campaign of resurgences. The NFL has been chaotic, with recent conference champions falling away and longtime underperformers ascending collectively. Under an typical year, Sean Payton guiding the his team to the summit of the conference would make him the overwhelming front-runner. But in such a turbulent and thrilling year, he's up against multiple other outstanding candidates.

Below is how the hypothetical ballot could look.

5) Ben Johnson, Chicago Bears, Their Record

Coach of the Year voters are fascinated by signal-callers. History shows this. Sean McVay in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. A third in 2022. If you transform a quarterback, you're halfway to winning the award.

Ben Johnson not only corrected Caleb Williams; he's unleashed him. In the right environment, Williams has been given the chance to demonstrate his rare talent. From midseason onward, the Bears rank number four in offensive EPA per play. That's not a hot streak – it's sustained excellence. Under his guidance, the quarterback has become more confident, less reckless, and has eagerly submitted to the scheme rather than freelancing. It is an offense constructed solely in Johnson's vision: a bully-ball ground attack, a heavy helping of play-action passes and a creative aerial game that frees wide receiver targets consistently. Williams has capitalized. And when easy reads haven't been available, he's been capable to spin big plays out of nothing.

The coach came to the Bears with a specific offensive vision. Virtually each decision – overhauling the trenches, highlighting the pass-catchers, turning Williams into a timing-based thrower – has paid off. That's uncommon for a first-year head coach. And it's rarer yet for a leader who walked into the organization with the immense hype he did. For consecutive straight cycles, he was the most sought-after candidate on the head coaching market. But when it comes to hiring a leader, there are no sure things. Remarkably, he has met expectations – and even surpassed them. He's proven not only to be a offensive dork but the kind of leader that can inject fresh energy into an organization.

During a ordinary year, he would be the overwhelming favorite. Yet the current isn't a normal year!

The area where Johnson's case comes slightly unstuck is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense presently sit in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are relying on takeaways, and turnovers are famously fickle. Defensive minds can focus on ball disruption, but nobody can guarantee it. He is on the ballot because the offense is real. He's not higher because variance is doing too much of the defense's work. If not for a couple breaks of the ball, the team would be two victories behind. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the foundation is established for sustained winning. However he comes up short here.

4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, 12-4

The Jaguars' coach is in a similar spot to his counterpart. He's another rookie head coach who has orchestrated a rapid resurgence. Over the crucial final weeks of the season, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the best overall ball of his career. And he's also spearheaded the transformation of a defense that now sits at fifth in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.

Even more notably, Coen has nailed the intangibles aspects, which wasn't a given following his early public appearances and some of his preseason moves.

The coach took over Jacksonville with an uncommonly inexperienced staff. In contrast to Johnson, who packed themselves with the ideal staff mix of new ideas and veteran savvy, he hired first-timers. From the head coach himself to coordinators to assistant coaches, the Jags are stocked with rookies. That type of approach is exciting on paper, but often collapses in practice – as past failures are a cautionary tale – because everyone is learning a their job in real-time. But he has managed to bring everyone and everything into sync.

Following an early strong start, there was a risk that the season would veer off the rails. A mid-year collapse had the Jags wobbling again. That's typically when coaches panic and change too much. He did not. Instead, he simplified things. Jacksonville stopped pursuing explosive plays and started hunting consistent ones. Coen refocused the offense around his playmakers and the running game, and asked his QB to use his legs more often.

The outcomes are evident. The Jags have won multiple games in a row and will be the conference's No 3 playoff seed. Coen receives the tiniest knock in the standings because he took over a talented roster, but he has proven he can maximize that roster.

3) Mike Macdonald, His Team, 13-3

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

Moving on from a incumbent, bringing in a different signal-caller and partnering him with an new play-caller might have ended the campaign in October. Rather, it shaped it. By the mid point of the season, the new QB was an Most Valuable Player candidate. He has cooled off since that hot streak, slipping to a lower rank in EPA per dropback over the latter part of the season, placing him only one spot ahead of peers.

Still