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Typically, the National Football League's Coach of the Year trophy follows a simple pattern. It frequently acts as a type of mea culpa. Sorry we got wrong your team in our preseason forecasts.

Theoretically, it's a direct path: the skipper who oversaw the most dramatic resurgence is handed the award. In practice, it fuels an annual debate about expectations and whether we're genuinely honoring excellent leadership or simply the greatest surprise.

However the current race is distinctly unique. The list of candidates is unusually deep. It has been the campaign of resurgences. The league has been chaotic, with recent conference champions declining and recent underperformers improving together. Under an ordinary season, a coach guiding the Denver Broncos to the summit of the conference would make him the clear favorite. But in this turbulent and fun year, he's competing with multiple other outstanding coaches.

Here is how the hypothetical ballot could look.

5) Ben Johnson, His Team, 11-5

Voters for Coach of the Year voters love signal-callers. History shows this. A certain coach in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. If you solve a quarterback, you're halfway to winning the award.

Ben Johnson not only corrected his young quarterback; he's freed him. In the right ecosystem, the QB has been given the opportunity to demonstrate his otherworldly ability. From midseason onward, the Chicago offense sit at fourth in offensive Expected Points Added per play. This isn't a lucky run – it's prolonged dominance. With his guidance, the quarterback has become more confident, less reckless, and has eagerly submitted to the gameplan instead of going rogue. It is an offense designed solely in the coach's vision: a physical run game, a heavy dose of play-action passes and a creative passing attack that springs wide receiver receivers everywhere. Williams has taken advantage. And when clear throws haven't been available, he's been capable to conjure magic from nothing.

Johnson arrived to the Bears with a specific offensive blueprint. Almost every gamble – overhauling the offensive line, featuring the tight ends, transforming the QB into a timing-based passer – has worked. That's rare for a first-year skipper. And it's rarer yet for a coach who walked into the building with the kind of pressure he did. For two straight cycles, he was the top name on the coaching market. But when it comes to selecting a head coach, there are no sure things. Remarkably, he has lived up to expectations – and even exceeded them. He's proven not just to be a scheme wizard but the type of culture builder that can inject new life into an franchise.

In a normal year, he would be the runaway choice. Yet this is not a typical year!

Where Johnson's candidacy comes slightly into trouble is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense presently rank 25th in defensive success rate. They are surviving on turnovers, and takeaways are notoriously unreliable. Coaches can stress creating turnovers, but no one can ensure it. He is on the ballot because the offensive production is sustainable. He's not higher because variance is doing too much of the defensive work. With a few breaks of the ball, the team would be two victories behind. It's been an exceptional transformation, and the foundation is established for long-term winning. But Johnson falls short in this ranking.

4) The Jacksonville Jaguars Coach, His Team, 12-4

Coen is in a comparable position to his counterpart. He's another rookie head coach who has masterminded a dramatic turnaround. Over the crucial final weeks of the year, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the finest overall ball of his professional life. And he's also overseen the overhaul of a defense that now sits at fifth in the NFL in EPA per play.

Even more impressively, Coen has excelled at the off-field aspects, which wasn't a given after his early press conference appearances and some of his offseason decisions.

The coach walked into the Jaguars with an exceptionally inexperienced staff. Unlike Johnson, who surrounded their staff with the ideal coaching mix of new ideas and veteran savvy, he trusted newbies. Starting with the head coach himself to coordinators to assistant coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with first-timers. That kind of setup is intriguing on paper, but often collapses in reality – with other teams are a warning – because everyone is figuring out a new job on the fly. But he has managed to bring the entire group and all elements into sync.

After an initial strong beginning, there was a possibility that the campaign would veer off the rails. A midseason collapse caused the team stumbling again. That's usually when leaders overcorrect. He did not. Rather, he streamlined the approach. The offense stopped pursuing home-run answers and started seeking consistent ones. Coen refocused the attack around key players and the ground attack, and asked his QB to use his legs more often.

The results are clear. The Jaguars have won multiple games consecutively and will be the AFC's number three playoff seed. He receives the slightest knock in the rankings because he inherited a skilled roster, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that talent.

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

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

Moving on from a incumbent, bringing in a different signal-caller and partnering him with an innovative offensive coordinator might have derailed the campaign in October. Instead, it made it. Through the middle point of the year, the new QB was an MVP contender. He has fallen away after that time, dropping to 23rd in EPA per pass attempt over the second half of the schedule, putting him just one spot ahead of peers.

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