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Ordinarily, the NFL's Head Coach of the Year award follows a simple pattern. It often serves as a form of apology. Our apologies we misjudged your squad in our preseason forecasts.

In theory, it's a clear-cut trajectory: the skipper who orchestrated the largest resurgence receives the award. However, it fuels an yearly discussion about expectations and whether we're genuinely honoring excellent leadership or simply the greatest shock.

But this year's competition is distinctly unique. The pool of nominees is unusually strong. It has been the season of resurgences. The league has been messy, with recent conference winners fading and recent strugglers rising together. In an normal season, a coach guiding the his team to the top of the AFC would make him the clear favorite. But in this wild and entertaining year, he's competing with several other exceptional coaches.

Here is how the hypothetical vote should be structured.

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

Coach of the Year voters are fascinated by quarterbacks. History shows this. A certain coach in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. Should you solve a franchise QB, you're halfway home.

The Bears' head coach didn't merely fixed his young quarterback; he's freed him. In the right system, the QB has been given the chance to showcase his special ability. From Week 9, the Chicago offense rank number four in offensive Expected Points Added per play. That's not a hot streak – it's sustained performance. Under his guidance, the quarterback has become increasingly confident, far less careless, and has willingly submitted to the system instead of improvising. It is an attack designed entirely in Johnson's vision: a physical run game, a steady dose of play-action passes and a imaginative passing attack that frees wide-open targets everywhere. Williams has taken advantage. And when clear throws weren't there, he's been able to conjure magic from broken plays.

The coach arrived to Chicago with a defined offensive blueprint. Almost every decision – overhauling the offensive line, utilizing the tight ends, transforming the QB into a timing-based passer – has paid off. This is rare for a first-year head coach. And it's even more uncommon still for a leader who walked into the organization with the immense pressure Johnson did. For two straight offseasons, he was the top candidate on the head coaching carousel. But when it comes to selecting a leader, there are no guarantees. Somehow, 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 culture builder that can breathe fresh energy into an organization.

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

The area where Johnson's case runs a bit into trouble is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense presently sit in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are relying on takeaways, and takeaways are famously unreliable. Coaches can emphasise creating turnovers, but no one can guarantee it. Johnson is on the list because the offense is sustainable. He's ranked lower because variance is doing an outsized share of the defense's work. If not for a couple bounces of the ball, the Bears would be several wins behind. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the core is established for long-term success. But he falls just short here.

4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, 12-4

The Jaguars' coach is in a similar position to his counterpart. He's another first-time head coach who has engineered a swift turnaround. Over the crucial final weeks of the year, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the most complete overall ball of his career. And he's also spearheaded the overhaul of a defensive unit that now sits at fifth in the league in EPA per play.

Even more notably, he has nailed the off-field aspects, which wasn't a given after his initial press conference appearances and some of his offseason moves.

Coen took over Jacksonville with an exceptionally raw coaching staff. In contrast to Johnson, who packed themselves with the perfect coaching blend of youth and experience, he hired first-timers. Starting with the head coach himself to assistants to assistant coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with rookies. That kind of setup is intriguing in theory, but frequently collapses in reality – with other teams are a warning – because everybody is learning a new job in real-time. Yet he has managed to bring everyone and everything into sync.

Following an early hot beginning, there was a risk that the season would go off the track. A midseason setback caused the team stumbling once more. That's usually when coaches overcorrect. He did not. Instead, he simplified things. Jacksonville stopped pursuing explosive plays and started hunting consistent ones. Coen refocused the attack around key players and the ground attack, and asked his QB to use his legs more.

The outcomes are clear. The Jags have won seven games in a row and will be the conference's number three seed. Coen receives the slightest deduction in the standings because he took over a skilled team, but he has proven he can maximize that talent.

3) Mike Macdonald, His Team, Their Record

Every Strong of the Year narrative has a hinge decision. For the Seahawks coach, it was his quarterback choice.

Moving on from a veteran, signing a different quarterback and partnering him with an new play-caller might have derailed the campaign in the early weeks. Instead, it made it. Through the middle point of the season, the new QB was an MVP contender. He has cooled off since that time, slipping to a lower rank in EPA per dropback over the latter part of the season, putting him only one place ahead of other QBs.

Still