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Typically, the NFL's Head Coach of the Year honor adheres to a straightforward formula. It often serves as a form of mea culpa. Sorry we got wrong your franchise in our preseason forecasts.

Theoretically, it's a clear-cut path: the skipper who orchestrated the largest resurgence wins the prize. In practice, it fuels an annual discussion about preseason outlooks and whether we're truly honoring superior coaching or merely the greatest upset.

However the latest race is profoundly different. The pool of candidates is unusually talented. It has been the campaign of resurgences. The league has been unpredictable, with reigning division winners declining and recent also-rans ascending collectively. Under an normal season, Sean Payton leading the Denver Broncos to the summit of the conference would make him the clear favorite. Yet in this wild and entertaining year, he's facing multiple other elite coaches.

This is how the hypothetical ballot ought to shake out.

5) The Chicago Bears Coach, His Team, 11-5

Coach of the Year voters love quarterbacks. This is a tradition. A certain coach in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. If you transform a quarterback, you're halfway to winning the award.

Ben Johnson hasn't just corrected his young quarterback; he's unlocked him. Given a proper ecosystem, the QB has been given the chance to demonstrate his special talent. Since midseason onward, the Bears sit at number four in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a hot streak – it's sustained performance. Under Johnson, Williams has become more confident, far less careless, and has willingly surrendered to the system rather than improvising. It is an attack designed entirely in Johnson's image: a bully-ball ground attack, a heavy dose of play-action and a innovative aerial game that frees wide-open receivers all over the field. The QB has thrived. And when easy reads weren't available, he's been able to spin big plays from nothing.

Johnson arrived to Chicago with a defined offensive vision. Virtually every decision – overhauling the offensive line, highlighting the tight ends, turning the QB into a rhythm thrower – has succeeded. This is uncommon for a first-year head coach. And it's even more uncommon yet for a leader who walked into the building with the immense pressure he did. For consecutive straight cycles, he was the most sought-after candidate on the head coaching market. However when it comes to selecting a leader, there are no sure things. Remarkably, Johnson has lived up to expectations – and even exceeded them. He's proven not just to be a scheme wizard but the kind of culture builder that can inject new life into an organization.

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

Where his candidacy comes a bit unstuck is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense currently rank in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are surviving on turnovers, and takeaways are notoriously fickle. Coaches can stress ball disruption, but nobody can ensure it. He is on the list because the offense is legitimate. He's not higher because luck is doing an outsized share of the defense's work. If not for a few bounces of the ball, the team would be several wins worse off. It's been an exceptional transformation, and the core is established for sustained success. But Johnson falls short in this ranking.

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

The Jaguars' coach is in a comparable position to Johnson. He's a fellow rookie head coach who has engineered a dramatic resurgence. During the stretch run of the year, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the most complete all-around ball of his professional life. And he's also overseen the transformation of a defense that now ranks number five in the NFL in EPA per play.

What's more notably, he has excelled at the off-field stuff, which was not a guarantee after his early public appearances and some of his offseason decisions.

Coen walked into the Jaguars with an exceptionally inexperienced staff. Unlike Johnson, who surrounded themselves with the perfect coaching cocktail of youth and veteran savvy, Coen bet on newbies. Starting with the leader on down to coordinators to assistant coaches, the Jags are filled with first-timers. That type of setup is exciting on paper, but frequently collapses in practice – as past failures are a cautionary tale – because everyone is figuring out a their job in real-time. But he has pulled the entire group and all elements together.

Following an early strong beginning, there was a possibility that the campaign would go off the track. A midseason collapse had the team stumbling once more. That's typically when leaders overcorrect. He didn't. Instead, he streamlined things. The offense stopped chasing home-run plays and started hunting sustainable ones. The coach recentered the attack around his playmakers and the running game, and asked his QB to use his legs more often.

The outcomes are evident. The Jags have won multiple games consecutively and will be the conference's No 3 seed. Coen gets the slightest knock in the standings because he took over a skilled roster, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that roster.

3) Mike Macdonald, Seattle Seahawks, Their Record

Every Strong of the Year argument has a defining decision. For the Seahawks coach, it was his QB move.

Parting ways from a incumbent, bringing in a different quarterback and partnering him with an innovative play-caller might have ended the campaign in October. Instead, it made it. By the middle point of the year, the new QB was an Most Valuable Player contender. He has cooled off after that time, slipping to 23rd in efficiency per dropback over the latter part of the schedule, placing him only a single spot ahead of peers.

Still