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Usually, the NFL's Coach of the Year honor adheres to a straightforward pattern. It often serves as a type of apology. Sorry we misjudged your franchise in our preseason predictions.

On paper, it's a direct line: the coach who oversaw the largest resurgence wins the award. However, it sparks an yearly debate about preseason outlooks and whether we're truly rewarding superior leadership or just the biggest upset.

However the latest competition is distinctly different. The group of candidates is unusually deep. It has been the year of resurgences. The NFL has been chaotic, with reigning conference winners declining and longtime strugglers ascending together. During an typical year, a coach guiding the his team to the top of the AFC would make him the stone-cold favorite. But in this chaotic and fun season, he's up against multiple other elite coaches.

This is how the projected vote ought to look.

5) The Chicago Bears Coach, Chicago Bears, Their Record

Voters for Coach of the Year voters love quarterbacks. History shows this. Sean McVay in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. A third in 2022. When you solve a quarterback, you're halfway to winning the award.

The Bears' head coach didn't merely corrected Caleb Williams; he's unleashed him. Given a proper environment, Williams has been afforded the chance to showcase his otherworldly ability. From midseason onward, the Bears rank fourth in offensive EPA per play. That's not a hot streak – it's prolonged dominance. With Johnson, Williams has become increasingly confident, far less careless, and has eagerly submitted to the system instead of improvising. It is an offense designed solely in the coach's vision: a bully-ball run game, a consistent dose of play-action and a creative passing attack that frees wide-open receivers consistently. Williams has capitalized. And when openings weren't there, he's been capable to create big plays out of broken plays.

Johnson came to Chicago with a clear offensive blueprint. Almost every bet – rebuilding the trenches, highlighting the tight ends, transforming the QB into a timing-based passer – has worked. This is uncommon for a rookie head coach. And it's rarer still for a coach who entered the building with the level of expectations he did. For consecutive straight cycles, he was the most sought-after name on the head coaching market. However when it comes to hiring a head coach, there are zero guarantees. Somehow, Johnson has met the hype – and even exceeded them. He's demonstrated not only to be a offensive genius but the type of leader that can inject fresh energy into an organization.

In a ordinary season, Johnson would be the runaway choice. But this isn't a typical season!

Where his candidacy runs slightly unstuck is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense presently sit 25th in defensive success rate. They are living on takeaways, and takeaways are famously unreliable. Coaches can stress ball disruption, but no one can guarantee it. Johnson is on the list because the offense is sustainable. He's not higher because luck is doing too much of the defensive heavy lifting. If not for a couple breaks of the ball, the Bears would be several victories worse off. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the core is in place for long-term success. However he comes up just short in this ranking.

4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, Their Record

Coen is in a comparable position to Johnson. He's a fellow first-time leader who has engineered a dramatic turnaround. Over the crucial final weeks of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the most complete all-around ball of his professional life. And he's also spearheaded the overhaul of a defense that now ranks fifth in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.

What's more notably, he has nailed the intangibles aspects, which was not a guarantee after his initial press conference appearances and some of his preseason moves.

The coach took over the Jaguars with an uncommonly raw staff. Unlike Johnson, who surrounded their staff with the ideal coaching cocktail of youth and experience, Coen hired first-timers. Starting with the leader on down to assistants to position coaches, the Jags are stocked with rookies. That kind of approach is exciting on paper, but frequently fails in reality – with other teams are a cautionary tale – because everybody is figuring out a new job on the fly. Yet he has pulled the entire group and everything together.

After an initial hot beginning, there was a risk that the season would go off the rails. A mid-year setback had the team wobbling once more. That's typically when coaches overcorrect. He didn't. Instead, he streamlined things. Jacksonville stopped pursuing home-run plays and started seeking sustainable ones. Coen refocused the offense around his playmakers and the ground attack, and encouraged his QB to use his legs more often.

The outcomes are evident. The Jaguars have won seven games in a row and will be the conference's number three playoff seed. He receives the tiniest knock in the standings because he inherited a skilled team, but he has demonstrated he can get the most out of that roster.

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

Each Strong of the Year narrative has a defining decision. For Mike Macdonald, it was his QB move.

Parting ways from a incumbent, signing a new quarterback and partnering him with an new offensive coordinator might have derailed the season in the early weeks. Rather, it made it. Through the middle point of the season, the acquisition was an MVP contender. He has cooled off since that hot streak, slipping to a lower rank in EPA per pass attempt over the second half of the season, placing him only one spot ahead of peers.

Still