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Typically, the NFL's Coach of the Year trophy adheres to a simple script. It frequently acts as a kind of apology. We regret we misjudged your squad in our preseason predictions.

In theory, it's a clear-cut trajectory: the coach who engineered the largest improvement is handed the award. However, it sparks an yearly discussion about expectations and whether we're genuinely rewarding superior leadership or merely the most shocking surprise.

Yet this year's competition is profoundly unique. The list of candidates is unusually strong. It has been the campaign of turnarounds. The league has been messy, with reigning division champions declining and recent underperformers improving together. During an typical season, a coach guiding the Denver Broncos to the summit of the AFC would make him the stone-cold front-runner. Yet in this wild and entertaining year, he's competing with several other exceptional coaches.

Here is how the ideal vote could shake out.

5) Ben Johnson, His Team, 11-5

Coach of the Year voters love QBs. This is a tradition. Sean McVay in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. A third in 2022. If you solve a quarterback, you're halfway home.

The Bears' head coach hasn't just fixed his young quarterback; he's freed him. Given a proper ecosystem, Williams has been given the opportunity to display his otherworldly ability. From midseason onward, the Bears rank fourth in offensive Expected Points Added per play. That's not a brief surge – it's consistent dominance. With his guidance, Williams has become more confident, far less careless, and has willingly surrendered to the system rather than going rogue. It is an attack designed entirely in Johnson's image: a bully-ball run game, a consistent helping of play-action and a innovative aerial game that creates wide receiver targets all over the field. The QB has taken advantage. And when easy reads haven't been there, he's been capable to spin magic out of broken plays.

Johnson came to the Bears with a specific offensive philosophy. Virtually every bet – overhauling the trenches, featuring the tight ends, turning Williams into a timing-based passer – has succeeded. This is uncommon for a first-year skipper. And it's even more uncommon still for a leader who walked into the organization with the immense pressure Johnson did. For two straight cycles, he was the hottest name on the head coaching carousel. But when it comes to selecting a head coach, there are no guarantees. Remarkably, Johnson has lived up to the hype – and even surpassed them. He's demonstrated not only to be a scheme genius but the kind of leader that can inject fresh energy into an organization.

During a normal year, he would be the runaway choice. But this isn't a typical campaign!

Where his candidacy runs slightly unstuck is on defense. The Chicago defense presently rank 25th in defensive efficiency. They are living on turnovers, and takeaways are famously unreliable. Defensive minds can stress ball disruption, but nobody can guarantee it. He is on the ballot because the offense is legitimate. He's not higher because variance is doing too much of the defense's work. With a few bounces of the ball, the Bears would be several victories worse off. It's been an exceptional turnaround, and the foundation is in place for sustained success. However Johnson comes up just short here.

4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, 12-4

Coen is in a comparable position to Johnson. He's another rookie head coach who has orchestrated a dramatic resurgence. During the crucial final weeks of the season, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the most complete all-around ball of his professional life. And he's also spearheaded the overhaul of a defense that now ranks number five in the NFL in EPA per play.

Even more notably, he has mastered the leadership aspects, which was not a certainty after his initial public introduction and some of his offseason decisions.

Coen took over the Jaguars with an exceptionally inexperienced staff. Unlike other coaches, who surrounded themselves with the perfect staff mix of new ideas and experience, Coen bet on first-timers. From the leader on down to assistants to assistant coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with first-timers. That kind of setup is intriguing on paper, but frequently fails in reality – as past failures are a warning – because everybody is figuring out a their job in real-time. Yet Coen has managed to bring the entire group and all elements together.

Following an early strong start, there was a chance that the season would go off the track. A midseason setback caused the Jags wobbling again. That's typically when leaders overcorrect. He didn't. Rather, he streamlined the approach. The offense stopped chasing explosive answers and started seeking sustainable ones. The coach refocused the attack around key players and the running game, and encouraged Lawrence to use his legs more often.

The outcomes are evident. The Jaguars have won seven games consecutively and will be the AFC's No 3 seed. Coen receives the slightest deduction in the standings because he inherited a talented roster, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that roster.

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

Each Coach of the Year case has a defining moment. For Mike Macdonald, it was his quarterback decision.

Moving on from a incumbent, signing a new quarterback and partnering him with an new offensive coordinator might have ended the season in the early weeks. Instead, it made it. Through the middle point of the year, the new QB was an Most Valuable Player contender. He has regressed after that hot streak, dropping to 23rd in efficiency per dropback over the second half of the season, placing him only a single place ahead of other QBs.

Still