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Typically, the National Football League's Head Coach of the Year award adheres to a simple pattern. It frequently acts as a form of mea culpa. Our apologies we misjudged your team in our preseason predictions.

In theory, it's a direct trajectory: the coach who orchestrated the largest turnaround is handed the prize. In reality, it fuels an annual discussion about expectations and whether we're actually rewarding superior coaching or just the greatest shock.

But this year's field is fundamentally unique. The pool of nominees is exceptionally deep. It has been the year of resurgences. The league has been chaotic, with reigning conference winners declining and longtime underperformers ascending together. During an normal year, Sean Payton leading the Denver Broncos to the top of the conference would make him the overwhelming front-runner. But in this wild and entertaining season, he's up against five other exceptional candidates.

Below is how the hypothetical vote ought to be structured.

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

Coach of the Year voters are fascinated by quarterbacks. This is a tradition. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. If you solve a franchise QB, you're halfway to winning the award.

Ben Johnson not only fixed his young quarterback; he's freed him. In the right environment, Williams has been given the opportunity to display his otherworldly talent. From Week 9, the Bears rank number four in offensive EPA per play. That's not a hot streak – it's consistent performance. With his guidance, the quarterback has become increasingly confident, far less careless, and has eagerly submitted to the gameplan instead of freelancing. It is an offense constructed solely in Johnson's image: a bully-ball run game, a steady dose of play-action passes and a imaginative aerial game that frees wide-open receivers everywhere. The QB has capitalized. And when easy reads haven't been available, he's been capable to conjure magic out of nothing.

Johnson arrived to the Bears with a defined offensive blueprint. Virtually every gamble – rebuilding the offensive line, utilizing the pass-catchers, turning Williams into a timing-based thrower – has paid off. That's rare for a first-year skipper. And it's rarer still for a leader who walked into the organization with the immense pressure Johnson did. For consecutive straight offseasons, he was the hottest name on the coaching market. But when it comes to selecting a head coach, there are no guarantees. Remarkably, Johnson has lived up to expectations – and even surpassed them. He's proven not only to be a offensive wizard but the kind of culture builder that can inject new life into an franchise.

During a typical year, he would be the clear-cut choice. But this is not a normal campaign!

The area where his case comes a bit unstuck is on defense. The Chicago defense currently rank in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are surviving on takeaways, and takeaways are notoriously fickle. Defensive minds can emphasise creating turnovers, but nobody can guarantee it. He is on the ballot because the offense is legitimate. He's ranked lower because variance is doing too much of the defensive heavy lifting. If not for a few breaks of the ball, the team would be two victories worse off. It's been an exceptional transformation, and the foundation is in place for long-term success. However he falls short here.

4) The Jacksonville Jaguars Coach, Jacksonville Jaguars, Their Record

The Jaguars' coach is in a comparable situation to his counterpart. He's another rookie leader who has engineered a dramatic resurgence. During the crucial final weeks of the season, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the finest all-around ball of his professional life. And he's also spearheaded the transformation of a defensive unit that now ranks number five in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.

What's more impressively, Coen has mastered the intangibles stuff, which was not a guarantee following his early press conference appearances and some of his preseason moves.

Coen took over the Jaguars with an uncommonly inexperienced staff. Unlike Johnson, who packed themselves with the ideal coaching blend of new ideas and veteran savvy, Coen hired newbies. From the leader himself to assistants to position coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with rookies. That kind of approach is intriguing in theory, but often collapses in reality – with other teams are a cautionary tale – because everyone is figuring out a their job on the fly. Yet Coen has pulled the entire group and everything into sync.

After an initial hot start, there was a risk that the season would go off the track. A midseason setback caused the Jags wobbling again. That's usually when leaders overcorrect. Coen didn't. Instead, he simplified the approach. The offense stopped chasing explosive answers and started hunting reliable ones. Coen recentered the attack around key players and the ground attack, and asked his QB to use his mobility more often.

The outcomes are clear. The Jags have won multiple games in a row and will be the AFC's number three playoff seed. He receives the slightest deduction in the rankings because he inherited a talented roster, but he has proven he can get the most out of that talent.

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

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

Parting ways from a incumbent, bringing in a different signal-caller and pairing him with an new offensive coordinator could have derailed the season in the early weeks. Rather, it defined it. Through the middle point of the year, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player candidate. He has fallen away since that hot streak, slipping to a lower rank in EPA per dropback over the second half of the season, putting him just a single place ahead of other QBs.

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