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Typically, the NFL's Head Coach of the Year honor follows a straightforward formula. It frequently serves as a kind of apology. We regret we got wrong your franchise in our preseason forecasts.

In theory, it's a clear-cut trajectory: the coach who engineered the largest turnaround receives the award. However, it fuels an yearly discussion about preseason outlooks and whether we're genuinely honoring excellent leadership or simply the biggest upset.

However the current race is fundamentally different. The pool of candidates is unusually talented. It has been the season of resurgences. The league has been chaotic, with recent division champions fading and recent strugglers improving together. In an normal season, Sean Payton leading the Denver Broncos to the summit of the conference would make him the stone-cold favorite. But in such a chaotic and fun year, he's facing five other exceptional coaches.

Below is how the hypothetical ballot ought to look.

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

Coach of the Year voters adore signal-callers. This is a tradition. A certain coach in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. Should you solve a quarterback, you're well on your way home.

The Bears' head coach didn't merely fixed Caleb Williams; he's unlocked him. Given a proper environment, Williams has been given the chance to display his otherworldly talent. From midseason onward, the Bears rank fourth in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a brief surge – it's sustained excellence. With his guidance, the quarterback has become increasingly decisive, less reckless, and has eagerly surrendered to the scheme instead of improvising. It is an attack constructed entirely in Johnson's vision: a physical ground attack, a steady helping of play-action passes and a creative aerial game that frees wide receiver receivers everywhere. Williams has capitalized. And when easy reads weren't there, he's been able to conjure big plays out of broken plays.

The coach arrived to Chicago with a defined offensive vision. Virtually every gamble – overhauling the offensive line, utilizing the tight ends, turning the QB into a timing-based passer – has paid off. This is uncommon for a rookie skipper. And it's even more uncommon yet for a coach who walked into the building with the level of expectations Johnson did. For two straight offseasons, he was the most sought-after name on the head coaching carousel. However when it comes to selecting a head coach, there are zero sure things. Remarkably, Johnson has lived up to the hype – and even surpassed them. He's proven not just to be a scheme dork but the kind of leader that can breathe new life into an organization.

During a typical year, Johnson would be the clear-cut favorite. Yet this is not a typical season!

The area where Johnson's case runs a bit into trouble is on the defensive side. The Bears currently sit 25th in defensive efficiency. They are surviving on turnovers, and turnovers are famously fickle. Defensive minds can focus on ball disruption, but nobody can guarantee it. He is on the ballot because the offensive production is sustainable. He's ranked lower because variance is doing an outsized share of the defensive heavy lifting. If not for a couple bounces of the ball, the team would be two victories worse off. It's been an exceptional turnaround, and the foundation is in place for sustained success. But Johnson falls just short in this ranking.

4) Liam Coen, His Team, 12-4

The Jaguars' coach is in a similar situation to Johnson. He's another first-time head coach who has orchestrated a swift turnaround. During the crucial final weeks of the season, he has his franchise quarterback playing the most complete overall football of his professional life. And he's also overseen the remaking of a defensive unit that now ranks fifth in the league in Expected Points Added per play.

Even more notably, Coen has nailed the intangibles aspects, which was not a guarantee following his early press conference introduction and some of his preseason decisions.

Coen walked into the Jaguars with an exceptionally raw coaching staff. Unlike other coaches, who surrounded themselves with the perfect coaching cocktail of youth and veteran savvy, Coen hired newbies. From the head coach himself to coordinators to assistant coaches, the Jags are filled with first-timers. That type of setup is exciting on paper, but often collapses in practice – as past failures are a warning – because everybody is learning a new job on the fly. Yet Coen has pulled the entire group and everything together.

After an early strong start, there was a risk that the campaign would go off the rails. A midseason setback had the team wobbling once more. That's usually when coaches panic and change too much. He did not. Instead, he simplified the approach. The offense stopped chasing explosive answers and started hunting consistent ones. Coen recentered the offense around key players and the ground attack, and asked his QB to use his mobility more often.

The outcomes are evident. The Jaguars have won seven games in a row and will be the AFC's number three seed. He gets the tiniest knock in the rankings because he took over a talented team, but he has proven he can get the most out of that talent.

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

Each Coach of the Year argument has a hinge decision. For Mike Macdonald, it was his quarterback choice.

Parting ways from a veteran, bringing in a new signal-caller and partnering him with an new play-caller could have ended the season in October. Rather, it made it. Through the mid point of the season, the new QB was an Most Valuable Player contender. He has fallen away after that hot streak, dropping to a lower rank in EPA per dropback over the latter part of the schedule, putting him just a single spot ahead of peers.

Still