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Ordinarily, the National Football League's Head Coach of the Year honor follows a straightforward script. It often serves as a kind of mea culpa. We regret we underestimated your franchise in our pre-campaign predictions.

On paper, it's a direct path: the coach who orchestrated the most dramatic improvement is handed the award. However, it sparks an yearly debate about expectations and whether we're genuinely honoring superior coaching or just the most shocking upset.

But the current race is distinctly different. The group of nominees is exceptionally deep. It has been the campaign of turnarounds. The NFL has been unpredictable, with recent conference winners declining and longtime underperformers improving collectively. In an ordinary year, a coach leading the Denver Broncos to the summit of the conference would make him the overwhelming favorite. But in this turbulent and fun year, he's facing five other outstanding candidates.

Here is how the hypothetical vote should look.

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

Voters for Coach of the Year voters love quarterbacks. They always have. A certain coach in 2017. Another in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. When you fix a quarterback, you're well on your way to winning the award.

The Bears' head coach didn't merely fixed his young quarterback; he's unlocked him. Given a proper environment, Williams 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. That's not a brief surge – it's consistent excellence. With Johnson, the quarterback has become increasingly confident, far less reckless, and has willingly submitted to the system instead of going rogue. It is an offense designed entirely in Johnson's vision: a physical ground attack, a heavy dose of play-action and a creative aerial game that creates wide-open receivers everywhere. Williams has capitalized. And when clear throws weren't there, he's been capable to create magic out of nothing.

Johnson came to Chicago with a clear offensive philosophy. Virtually every bet – overhauling the offensive line, utilizing the pass-catchers, turning Williams into a rhythm thrower – has worked. This is rare for a rookie head coach. And it's rarer yet for a coach who walked into the organization with the level of pressure he did. For two straight offseasons, he was the hottest name on the head coaching carousel. But when it comes to hiring a leader, there are no sure things. Remarkably, Johnson has met the hype – and even exceeded them. He's proven not only to be a scheme genius but the kind of leader that can inject new life into an organization.

During a typical season, Johnson would be the runaway favorite. But the current isn't a typical year!

The area where Johnson's candidacy runs slightly unstuck is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense currently rank 25th in defensive efficiency. They are living on turnovers, and turnovers are notoriously inconsistent. Coaches can emphasise creating turnovers, but nobody can ensure it. Johnson is on the ballot because the offensive production is real. He's ranked lower because luck is doing an outsized share of the defense's work. If not for a few breaks of the ball, the team would be two wins behind. It's been an exceptional transformation, and the foundation is in place for long-term winning. But he falls short in this ranking.

4) The Jacksonville Jaguars Coach, Jacksonville Jaguars, Their Record

The Jaguars' coach is in a comparable spot to his counterpart. He's another rookie head coach who has masterminded a rapid turnaround. Over the stretch run of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the most complete overall ball of his career. And he's also spearheaded the overhaul of a defensive unit that now ranks number five in the league in Expected Points Added per play.

Even more notably, Coen has nailed the intangibles aspects, which wasn't a guarantee after his initial press conference appearances and some of his preseason moves.

Coen walked into the Jaguars with an uncommonly inexperienced coaching staff. Unlike other coaches, who surrounded themselves with the ideal staff blend of new ideas and veteran savvy, he bet on first-timers. Starting with the leader himself to assistants to assistant coaches, the Jags are stocked with rookies. That kind of setup is intriguing in theory, but often fails in reality – as past failures are a cautionary tale – because everybody is learning a their job on the fly. But Coen 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 rails. A midseason setback caused the Jags stumbling again. That's typically when leaders overcorrect. Coen didn't. Instead, he streamlined the approach. Jacksonville stopped pursuing home-run answers and started seeking sustainable ones. Coen recentered the offense around key players and the ground attack, and asked Lawrence to use his legs more.

The outcomes are obvious. The Jaguars have won seven games in a row and will be the AFC's No 3 seed. He gets the tiniest deduction in the standings because he inherited a skilled team, but he has demonstrated he can get the most out of that talent.

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

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

Parting ways from a incumbent, bringing in a new quarterback and pairing him with an innovative offensive coordinator could have derailed the season in the early weeks. Instead, it made it. By the middle point of the season, the new QB was an MVP contender. He has fallen away since that hot streak, slipping to a lower rank in EPA per dropback over the latter part of the schedule, putting him only a single spot ahead of other QBs.

Still