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Typically, the National Football League's Coach of the Year award adheres to a straightforward pattern. It often serves as a kind of mea culpa. We regret we got wrong your team in our pre-campaign predictions.

In theory, it's a direct trajectory: the skipper who engineered the most dramatic improvement wins the prize. In practice, it creates an annual discussion about preseason outlooks and whether we're actually honoring superior leadership or simply the biggest upset.

However this year's competition is distinctly different. The group of contenders is exceptionally deep. It has been the campaign of turnarounds. The league has been unpredictable, with recent conference winners declining and longtime strugglers improving collectively. During an ordinary year, Sean Payton leading the his team to the summit of the AFC would make him the overwhelming front-runner. Yet in this chaotic and fun season, he's competing with several other exceptional candidates.

This is how the ideal vote ought to look.

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

Coach of the Year voters adore QBs. They always have. A certain coach in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. Should you transform a franchise QB, you're well on your way home.

Ben Johnson didn't merely fixed Caleb Williams; he's freed him. In the right system, the QB has been afforded the opportunity to display his otherworldly ability. Since midseason onward, the Bears sit at number four in offensive EPA per play. That's not a lucky run – it's sustained performance. With Johnson, the quarterback has become increasingly decisive, far less careless, and has eagerly surrendered to the system rather than going rogue. It is an offense designed entirely in Johnson's image: a bully-ball ground attack, a heavy dose of play-action and a innovative passing attack that frees wide-open receivers all over the field. Williams has thrived. And when easy reads weren't there, he's been capable to conjure big plays out of nothing.

The coach arrived to Chicago with a clear offensive vision. Almost each gamble – rebuilding the offensive line, utilizing the pass-catchers, transforming the QB into a timing-based thrower – has succeeded. That's uncommon for a rookie skipper. And it's even more uncommon still for a coach who walked into the organization with the kind of pressure Johnson did. For two straight offseasons, he was the hottest name on the head coaching carousel. However when it comes to hiring a head coach, there are no guarantees. Somehow, he has lived up to expectations – and even exceeded them. He's demonstrated not just to be a offensive genius but the type of leader that can inject new life into an organization.

In a normal season, Johnson would be the overwhelming choice. Yet the current isn't a normal campaign!

The area where Johnson's candidacy runs a bit unstuck is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense currently rank in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are relying on turnovers, and takeaways are famously unreliable. Defensive minds can emphasise creating turnovers, but nobody can guarantee it. Johnson is on the list because the offensive production is legitimate. He's not higher because luck is doing an outsized share of the defense's work. With a few bounces of the ball, the Bears would be several wins behind. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the core is established for sustained winning. But he comes up short here.

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 masterminded a swift resurgence. Over the stretch run of the year, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the best overall ball of his professional life. And he's also overseen the overhaul of a defensive unit that now ranks fifth in the league in Expected Points Added per play.

Even more impressively, he has mastered the intangibles stuff, which was not a guarantee after his early press conference appearances and some of his offseason moves.

Coen took over the Jaguars with an exceptionally inexperienced coaching staff. In contrast to Johnson, who surrounded themselves with the ideal coaching cocktail of youth and veteran savvy, Coen trusted first-timers. Starting with the head coach on down to assistants to position coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with first-timers. That type of setup is intriguing in theory, but often fails in practice – as past failures are a warning – because everybody is figuring out a their job in real-time. But Coen has pulled the entire group and everything together.

After an early hot start, there was a risk that the season would veer off the rails. A midseason collapse had the team wobbling again. That's usually when leaders panic and change too much. Coen didn't. Instead, he streamlined the approach. The offense stopped pursuing explosive answers and started hunting consistent ones. Coen recentered the attack around his playmakers and the ground attack, and asked his QB to use his mobility more.

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

3) Mike Macdonald, Seattle Seahawks, 13-3

Every Coach of the Year narrative has a pivotal moment. For Mike Macdonald, it was his QB choice.

Moving on from a incumbent, bringing in a different quarterback and partnering him with an new play-caller might have ended the season in the early weeks. Rather, it made it. By the mid point of the year, the acquisition was an MVP front-runner. He has cooled off since that time, slipping to 23rd in efficiency per dropback over the latter part of the season, placing him only one spot ahead of peers.

Still