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Usually, the National Football League's Head Coach of the Year trophy follows a straightforward formula. It commonly acts as a form of apology. Sorry we got wrong your squad in our pre-campaign forecasts.

In theory, it's a direct path: the skipper who orchestrated the most dramatic resurgence receives the prize. In reality, it fuels an yearly discussion about expectations and whether we're genuinely rewarding excellent coaching or simply the biggest shock.

However the latest competition is profoundly different. The list of nominees is remarkably talented. It has been the campaign of comebacks. The NFL has been messy, with recent division champions declining and recent also-rans improving in unison. During an ordinary season, Sean Payton guiding the his team to the top of the conference would make him the stone-cold favorite. But in this turbulent and entertaining season, he's competing with multiple other outstanding coaches.

This is how the hypothetical ballot ought to shake out.

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

Voters for Coach of the Year selectors love quarterbacks. This is a tradition. Sean McVay in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. A third in 2022. Should you solve a franchise QB, you're halfway to winning the award.

The Bears' head coach not only fixed Caleb Williams; he's unleashed him. Within an ideal environment, Williams has been given the opportunity to display his otherworldly talent. From Week 9, the Bears sit at fourth in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a hot streak – it's consistent dominance. With his guidance, the quarterback has become more decisive, far less reckless, and has willingly surrendered to the scheme rather than going rogue. It is an attack built solely in Johnson's vision: a physical ground attack, a steady dose of play-action passes and a imaginative passing attack that springs wide-open receivers consistently. Williams has thrived. And when openings haven't been there, he's been able to spin magic out of nothing.

Johnson arrived to the Bears with a specific offensive blueprint. Almost each bet – rebuilding the offensive line, featuring the pass-catchers, turning Williams into a rhythm passer – has worked. That's uncommon for a rookie head coach. And it's rarer still for a leader who walked into the building with the immense pressure Johnson did. For two straight offseasons, he was the hottest candidate on the coaching market. But when it comes to selecting a leader, there are zero guarantees. Somehow, he has met the hype – and even exceeded them. He's proven not only to be a offensive wizard but the type of leader that can inject new life into an franchise.

During a normal year, Johnson would be the overwhelming favorite. But the current is not a normal season!

The area where Johnson's candidacy comes slightly unstuck is on defense. The Bears currently rank in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are surviving on takeaways, and turnovers are notoriously fickle. Defensive minds can stress creating turnovers, but nobody can guarantee it. He is on the list because the offensive production is sustainable. He's not higher because variance is doing too much of the defensive heavy lifting. If not for a few bounces of the ball, the team would be two victories behind. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the core is in place for sustained success. But Johnson falls just short in this ranking.

4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, 12-4

Coen is in a similar position to his counterpart. He's another rookie leader who has engineered a dramatic turnaround. Over the stretch run of the season, he has his franchise quarterback playing the finest all-around football of his professional life. And he's also spearheaded the remaking of a defense that now ranks fifth in the league in Expected Points Added per play.

Even more notably, he has nailed the intangibles stuff, which was not a given after his early public introduction and some of his offseason decisions.

The coach walked into the Jaguars with an uncommonly inexperienced coaching staff. In contrast to other coaches, who surrounded their staff with the ideal coaching mix of new ideas and experience, Coen bet on first-timers. Starting with the head coach himself to coordinators to assistant coaches, the Jaguars are filled with rookies. That type of setup is intriguing on paper, but frequently collapses in practice – as past failures are a warning – because everyone is learning a their job on the fly. But he has pulled everyone and everything together.

After an early strong start, there was a chance that the season would go off the rails. A mid-year setback caused the Jags wobbling again. That's usually when coaches panic and change too much. He did not. Instead, he simplified things. Jacksonville stopped pursuing home-run answers and started hunting sustainable ones. The coach refocused the attack around his playmakers and the ground attack, and encouraged his QB to use his mobility more.

The outcomes are clear. The Jaguars have won seven games consecutively and will be the conference's No 3 seed. He receives the tiniest deduction in the rankings because he took over a talented team, but he has proven he can get the most out of that talent.

3) Mike Macdonald, His Team, 13-3

Every Strong of the Year argument has a hinge decision. For Mike Macdonald, it was his QB move.

Parting ways from a incumbent, signing a different signal-caller and partnering him with an new play-caller could have ended the campaign in October. Rather, it defined it. By the middle point of the year, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player candidate. He has fallen away after that hot streak, dropping to 23rd in EPA per pass attempt over the second half of the schedule, placing him only a single place ahead of peers.

Still