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Usually, the NFL's Head Coach of the Year honor adheres to a straightforward pattern. It often functions as a form of mea culpa. Our apologies we underestimated your franchise in our preseason predictions.

Theoretically, it's a clear-cut trajectory: the skipper who orchestrated the largest improvement is handed the prize. However, it fuels an annual argument about preseason outlooks and whether we're genuinely honoring excellent leadership or merely the greatest shock.

However the latest field is distinctly unique. The pool of candidates is unusually talented. It has been the campaign of comebacks. The NFL has been unpredictable, with recent division winners fading and recent underperformers improving in unison. During an ordinary year, Sean Payton leading the Denver Broncos to the top of the conference would make him the stone-cold favorite. But in this turbulent and thrilling year, he's facing several other elite coaches.

This is how the ideal ballot ought to shake out.

5) Ben Johnson, Chicago Bears, 11-5

Voters for Coach of the Year selectors love quarterbacks. They always have. Sean McVay in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. Should you fix a quarterback, you're halfway to winning the award.

The Bears' head coach didn't merely fixed Caleb Williams; he's unleashed him. Within an ideal system, the QB has been afforded the opportunity to demonstrate his rare talent. Since Week 9, the Bears rank number four in offensive Expected Points Added per play. That's not a hot streak – it's consistent performance. Under Johnson, Williams has become increasingly confident, less careless, and has willingly submitted to the gameplan instead of improvising. It is an offense designed entirely in the coach's image: a bully-ball run game, a consistent dose of play-action passes and a innovative aerial game that springs wide receiver targets consistently. The QB has thrived. And when clear throws weren't there, he's been able to conjure magic out of nothing.

Johnson arrived to the Bears with a specific offensive blueprint. Virtually each bet – overhauling the trenches, highlighting the tight ends, turning the QB into a timing-based passer – has paid off. That's rare for a first-year skipper. And it's even more uncommon still for a coach who walked into the building with the immense hype Johnson did. For two straight offseasons, he was the top candidate on the head coaching market. However when it comes to hiring a head coach, there are zero sure things. Somehow, Johnson has lived up to the hype – and even exceeded them. He's proven not just to be a scheme wizard but the type of culture builder that can inject fresh energy into an franchise.

In a normal year, Johnson would be the runaway favorite. Yet this is not a normal year!

The area where Johnson's case comes a bit into trouble is on defense. The Bears currently rank in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are living on turnovers, and takeaways are famously fickle. Defensive minds can emphasise creating turnovers, but no one can guarantee it. Johnson is on the ballot because the offense is real. He's not higher because variance is doing an outsized share of the defensive work. If not for a few bounces of the ball, the Bears would be two wins worse off. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the core is established for sustained winning. However Johnson falls just short in this ranking.

4) Liam Coen, His Team, Their Record

Coen is in a similar situation to Johnson. He's a fellow rookie leader who has masterminded a swift resurgence. Over the stretch run of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the best overall football of his professional life. And he's also overseen the overhaul of a defense that now sits at fifth in the league in EPA per play.

Even more notably, he has nailed the leadership stuff, which wasn't a guarantee after his early public introduction and some of his preseason moves.

The coach walked into the Jaguars with an exceptionally raw staff. Unlike other coaches, who packed their staff with the ideal staff blend of youth and experience, Coen hired first-timers. From the leader himself to assistants to position coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with rookies. That type of setup is intriguing in theory, but frequently fails in reality – with other teams are a cautionary tale – because everyone is figuring out a their job in real-time. Yet Coen has managed to bring the entire group and everything into sync.

After an early strong beginning, there was a chance that the campaign would veer off the rails. A mid-year setback had the Jags wobbling once more. That's typically when leaders panic and change too much. Coen did not. Rather, he streamlined things. Jacksonville stopped chasing home-run plays and started seeking sustainable ones. The coach refocused the attack around key players and the ground attack, and asked Lawrence to use his legs more often.

The outcomes are evident. The Jaguars have won seven games consecutively and will be the conference's No 3 playoff seed. Coen receives the tiniest deduction in the rankings because he took over a skilled team, but he has proven he can maximize that talent.

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

Every Coach of the Year argument has a pivotal moment. For the Seahawks coach, it was his quarterback choice.

Parting ways from a veteran, bringing in a new signal-caller and pairing him with an innovative play-caller could have ended the campaign in the early weeks. Instead, it defined it. By the mid point of the year, the acquisition was an MVP contender. He has cooled off since that hot streak, slipping to a lower rank in efficiency per pass attempt over the second half of the schedule, placing him only a single spot ahead of peers.

Still