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Usually, the NFL's Coach of the Year award follows a simple formula. It often serves as a type of apology. Sorry we got wrong your franchise in our pre-campaign forecasts.

In theory, it's a direct line: the coach who engineered the largest improvement receives the award. However, it fuels an yearly discussion about expectations and whether we're actually rewarding superior coaching or just the most shocking shock.

But this year's race is profoundly different. The pool of candidates is exceptionally strong. It has been the campaign of comebacks. The league has been messy, with reigning division champions declining and recent also-rans rising together. During an ordinary season, a coach leading the Denver Broncos to the top of the AFC would make him the clear front-runner. Yet in such a turbulent and entertaining season, he's competing with five other exceptional candidates.

This is how the ideal ballot should be structured.

5) Ben Johnson, His Team, Their Record

Coach of the Year selectors adore QBs. History shows this. A certain coach in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. A third in 2022. When you transform a quarterback, you're well on your way home.

The Bears' head coach hasn't just corrected Caleb Williams; he's unlocked him. Given a proper environment, Williams has been given the chance to display his rare ability. From Week 9, the Chicago offense rank fourth in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a brief surge – it's sustained excellence. Under Johnson, the quarterback has become increasingly decisive, far less careless, and has eagerly surrendered to the scheme rather than going rogue. It is an offense constructed entirely in Johnson's vision: a physical ground attack, a consistent dose of play-action passes and a innovative passing attack that springs wide-open receivers consistently. The QB has capitalized. And when openings haven't been available, he's been able to create big plays from broken plays.

The coach arrived to the Bears with a defined offensive vision. Virtually every bet – rebuilding the trenches, highlighting the tight ends, transforming Williams into a timing-based thrower – has paid off. This is rare for a rookie head coach. And it's rarer still for a coach who walked into the organization with the immense expectations Johnson did. For two straight offseasons, he was the most sought-after name on the coaching carousel. But when it comes to hiring a leader, there are no guarantees. Remarkably, Johnson has lived up to the hype – and even surpassed them. He's demonstrated not only to be a offensive wizard but the type of leader that can breathe new life into an organization.

In a ordinary season, Johnson would be the runaway favorite. Yet the current is not a typical season!

Where his candidacy comes slightly into trouble is on the defensive side. The Bears presently rank 25th in defensive efficiency. They are relying on turnovers, and takeaways are famously inconsistent. Coaches can focus on creating turnovers, but nobody can guarantee it. He is on the list because the offense is legitimate. He's not higher because variance is doing too much of the defensive work. With a couple breaks of the ball, the team would be two wins worse off. It's been an exceptional turnaround, and the foundation is in place for sustained winning. However he comes up just short in this ranking.

4) Liam Coen, His Team, Their Record

Coen is in a similar position to his counterpart. He's another rookie leader who has masterminded a dramatic resurgence. During the crucial final weeks of the season, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the finest overall ball of his professional life. And he's also spearheaded the transformation of a defensive unit that now sits at number five in the NFL in EPA per play.

Even more impressively, he has nailed the leadership stuff, which was not a given after his initial public introduction and some of his offseason decisions.

The coach walked into Jacksonville with an uncommonly raw coaching staff. Unlike Johnson, who packed their staff with the ideal coaching mix of youth and experience, he hired newbies. Starting with the leader himself to coordinators to assistant coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with rookies. That kind of approach is exciting in theory, but frequently fails in practice – as past failures are a warning – because everybody is learning a their job on the fly. Yet Coen has pulled everyone and all elements together.

After an early hot start, there was a chance that the season would veer off the track. A mid-year setback caused the team wobbling again. That's usually when coaches panic and change too much. Coen didn't. Instead, he streamlined the approach. Jacksonville stopped chasing home-run answers and started hunting reliable ones. Coen refocused the offense around his playmakers and the running game, and asked his QB to use his legs more often.

The outcomes are clear. The Jags have won seven games in a row and will be the conference's number three seed. He gets the tiniest deduction in the standings because he took over a talented roster, but he has proven he can maximize that roster.

3) Mike Macdonald, Seattle Seahawks, Their Record

Each Strong of the Year narrative has a pivotal moment. For Mike Macdonald, it was his QB move.

Parting ways from a incumbent, bringing in a new signal-caller and partnering him with an new play-caller could have derailed the season in October. Rather, it made it. Through the middle point of the year, the new QB was an Most Valuable Player contender. He has fallen away since that time, dropping to a lower rank in EPA per dropback over the second half of the season, putting him just one spot ahead of other QBs.

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