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Ordinarily, the National Football League's Head Coach of the Year honor adheres to a simple pattern. It commonly acts as a kind of mea culpa. Our apologies we underestimated your franchise in our preseason predictions.

Theoretically, it's a clear-cut path: the skipper who engineered the most dramatic turnaround wins the prize. In practice, it fuels an yearly argument about expectations and whether we're actually honoring excellent leadership or simply the greatest surprise.

But the latest competition is profoundly different. The pool of contenders is exceptionally strong. It has been the year of turnarounds. The NFL has been unpredictable, with reigning division winners fading and longtime strugglers rising in unison. During an ordinary year, Sean Payton leading the Denver Broncos to the summit of the AFC would make him the stone-cold front-runner. But in this wild and thrilling season, he's facing multiple other exceptional candidates.

Below is how the hypothetical vote should shake out.

5) Ben Johnson, Chicago Bears, Their Record

Coach of the Year selectors adore QBs. This is a tradition. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. Should you solve a franchise QB, you're halfway home.

The Bears' head coach didn't merely corrected Caleb Williams; he's unleashed him. Within an ideal system, Williams has been afforded the chance to display his otherworldly ability. From midseason onward, the Chicago offense rank number four in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a lucky run – it's consistent dominance. Under Johnson, the quarterback has become more confident, less reckless, and has eagerly submitted to the scheme rather than going rogue. It is an offense constructed entirely in Johnson's vision: a physical ground attack, a heavy dose of play-action passes and a imaginative passing attack that creates wide receiver targets everywhere. Williams has taken advantage. And when clear throws haven't been there, he's been able to spin magic from broken plays.

The coach came to Chicago with a defined offensive blueprint. Virtually each decision – overhauling the trenches, featuring the tight ends, transforming Williams into a timing-based thrower – has paid off. This is uncommon for a first-year skipper. And it's rarer yet for a coach who walked into the building with the level of pressure Johnson did. For consecutive straight cycles, he was the top candidate on the head coaching carousel. But when it comes to selecting a head coach, there are zero guarantees. Somehow, he has lived up to expectations – and even surpassed them. He's demonstrated not just to be a offensive dork but the type of culture builder that can inject new life into an franchise.

During a typical year, Johnson would be the overwhelming favorite. But the current is not a normal season!

Where Johnson's case runs a bit unstuck is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense presently sit in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are living on takeaways, and turnovers are famously unreliable. 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 variance is doing too much of the defense's heavy lifting. With a few bounces of the ball, the team would be two victories worse off. It's been an exceptional transformation, and the foundation is in place for sustained winning. However he falls short here.

4) Liam Coen, His Team, Their Record

The Jaguars' coach is in a comparable position to his counterpart. He's another first-time leader who has orchestrated a dramatic resurgence. Over the stretch run of the year, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the most complete overall football of his career. And he's also spearheaded the remaking of a defensive unit that now sits at number five in the NFL in EPA per play.

Even more notably, he has mastered the leadership aspects, which was not a guarantee after his early public appearances and some of his preseason decisions.

Coen took over Jacksonville with an uncommonly inexperienced coaching staff. In contrast to Johnson, who packed themselves with the perfect coaching blend of youth and veteran savvy, Coen bet on newbies. Starting with the head coach on down to assistants to assistant coaches, the Jags are filled with first-timers. That type of setup is exciting on paper, but often fails in practice – with other teams are a warning – because everybody is figuring out a new job in real-time. Yet he has managed to bring the entire group and all elements together.

After an early hot beginning, there was a possibility that the season would go off the track. A midseason setback had the team wobbling once more. That's typically when leaders overcorrect. Coen did not. Rather, he simplified the approach. The offense stopped pursuing home-run plays and started seeking sustainable ones. Coen recentered the attack around key players and the ground attack, and encouraged Lawrence to use his mobility more.

The outcomes are clear. The Jags have won seven games consecutively and will be the AFC's number three playoff seed. Coen gets the slightest deduction in the rankings because he inherited a skilled team, but he has proven he can maximize that talent.

3) Mike Macdonald, Seattle Seahawks, 13-3

Each Strong of the Year case has a hinge decision. For Mike Macdonald, it was his quarterback decision.

Parting ways from a veteran, signing a different signal-caller and partnering him with an innovative offensive coordinator could have ended the campaign in October. Rather, it shaped it. By the middle point of the season, the new QB was an Most Valuable Player candidate. He has fallen away since that time, slipping to 23rd in efficiency per pass attempt over the second half of the season, putting him just one place ahead of peers.

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