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Ordinarily, the NFL's Head Coach of the Year award follows a straightforward formula. It often acts as a type of apology. Sorry we misjudged your team in our pre-campaign forecasts.

Theoretically, it's a direct line: the skipper who engineered the largest improvement receives the award. In reality, it fuels an annual debate about expectations and whether we're actually honoring excellent leadership or simply the most shocking upset.

But the latest race is fundamentally different. The list of contenders is unusually talented. It has been the year of turnarounds. The NFL has been messy, with recent division champions fading and longtime underperformers rising together. In an ordinary season, a coach leading the his team to the top of the conference would make him the clear favorite. Yet in such a chaotic and thrilling year, he's up against multiple other elite candidates.

Below is how the hypothetical ballot ought to look.

5) Ben Johnson, His Team, Their Record

Coach of the Year voters adore QBs. They always have. A certain coach in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. When you fix a franchise QB, you're halfway home.

The Bears' head coach not only corrected his young quarterback; he's unlocked him. Given a proper ecosystem, the QB has been afforded the opportunity to demonstrate his rare talent. Since midseason onward, the Chicago offense sit at fourth in offensive EPA per play. That's not a hot streak – it's sustained excellence. With Johnson, the quarterback has become more confident, less reckless, and has willingly surrendered to the scheme rather than going rogue. It is an attack constructed solely in Johnson's image: a bully-ball run game, a steady helping of play-action and a creative aerial game that frees wide-open receivers everywhere. The QB has thrived. And when easy reads weren't available, he's been capable to create magic out of nothing.

The coach came to Chicago with a clear offensive vision. Virtually every bet – overhauling the offensive line, utilizing the pass-catchers, turning Williams into a rhythm passer – has worked. That's uncommon for a first-year head coach. And it's rarer still for a coach who walked into the building with the level of hype Johnson did. For consecutive straight offseasons, he was the hottest name on the head coaching carousel. But when it comes to hiring a leader, there are no guarantees. Remarkably, he has lived up to the hype – and even surpassed them. He's demonstrated not just to be a scheme genius but the type of culture builder that can breathe fresh energy into an franchise.

During a normal season, Johnson would be the runaway favorite. But the current isn't a typical year!

The area where Johnson's case runs a bit unstuck is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense currently sit in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are relying on takeaways, and turnovers are notoriously inconsistent. Defensive minds can stress creating turnovers, but no one can ensure it. Johnson is on the ballot because the offense is real. He's ranked lower because variance is doing too much of the defensive work. If not for a couple breaks of the ball, the team would be several victories behind. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the foundation is established for sustained success. However Johnson falls short in this ranking.

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

Coen is in a similar situation to his counterpart. He's a fellow rookie leader who has masterminded a rapid turnaround. During the stretch run of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the finest all-around football of his professional life. And he's also overseen the overhaul of a defense that now ranks fifth in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.

Even more impressively, Coen has excelled at the leadership stuff, which was not a given after his early press conference appearances and some of his preseason moves.

Coen walked into Jacksonville with an uncommonly inexperienced coaching staff. In contrast to Johnson, who packed themselves with the perfect coaching cocktail of youth and experience, he bet on first-timers. From the leader on down to coordinators to position coaches, the Jags are filled with rookies. That type of approach is intriguing in theory, but frequently fails in practice – as past failures are a cautionary tale – because everyone is figuring out a new job in real-time. Yet he has pulled everyone and everything together.

Following an initial strong beginning, there was a chance that the season would veer off the track. A midseason collapse caused the team wobbling once more. That's typically when coaches panic and change too much. Coen did not. Rather, he streamlined the approach. The offense stopped pursuing home-run plays and started seeking sustainable ones. Coen refocused the offense around key players and the running game, and encouraged Lawrence to use his legs more often.

The results are clear. The Jaguars have won multiple games in a row and will be the AFC's No 3 playoff seed. He receives the tiniest deduction in the standings because he inherited a talented team, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that roster.

3) Mike Macdonald, His Team, 13-3

Every Coach of the Year narrative has a pivotal decision. For the Seahawks coach, it was his QB choice.

Moving on from a incumbent, signing a new quarterback and pairing him with an new play-caller could have ended the campaign in the early weeks. Rather, it made it. By the middle point of the year, the new QB was an Most Valuable Player contender. He has regressed after that time, slipping to a lower rank in EPA per pass attempt over the second half of the season, placing him only one place ahead of other QBs.

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