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Usually, the National Football League's Coach of the Year honor follows a simple script. It commonly acts as a form of apology. We regret we got wrong your franchise in our pre-campaign predictions.

Theoretically, it's a direct line: the coach who orchestrated the most dramatic resurgence is handed the award. In practice, it creates an yearly discussion about preseason outlooks and whether we're genuinely honoring superior leadership or merely the most shocking surprise.

However this year's field is distinctly unique. The list of contenders is exceptionally talented. It has been the year of resurgences. The league has been messy, with recent division winners declining and longtime underperformers rising in unison. Under an ordinary year, Sean Payton leading the Denver Broncos to the top of the conference would make him the clear front-runner. But in this wild and entertaining year, he's up against several other outstanding candidates.

Here is how the ideal vote could look.

5) Ben Johnson, His Team, 11-5

Voters for Coach of the Year voters adore signal-callers. They always have. A certain coach in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. A third in 2022. If you solve a franchise QB, you're halfway to winning the award.

The Bears' head coach hasn't just fixed Caleb Williams; he's unlocked him. In the right environment, Williams has been afforded the opportunity to display his special ability. Since midseason onward, the Bears sit at fourth in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a hot streak – it's prolonged dominance. Under his guidance, Williams has become increasingly confident, less careless, and has eagerly submitted to the scheme instead of freelancing. It is an attack built entirely in the coach's image: a physical run game, a heavy helping of play-action passes and a innovative aerial game that creates wide receiver targets consistently. The QB has taken advantage. And when easy reads weren't there, he's been able to spin big plays from nothing.

Johnson came to Chicago with a defined offensive vision. Virtually each bet – overhauling the trenches, highlighting the pass-catchers, transforming Williams into a timing-based passer – has worked. This is uncommon for a rookie head coach. And it's rarer yet for a leader who walked into the building with the kind of hype he did. For consecutive straight cycles, he was the top candidate on the head coaching market. But when it comes to selecting a head coach, there are no guarantees. Somehow, Johnson has met the hype – and even surpassed them. He's demonstrated not only to be a scheme wizard but the kind of leader that can breathe new life into an organization.

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

The area where Johnson's case comes a bit unstuck is on defense. The Bears currently rank 25th in defensive efficiency. They are surviving on takeaways, and takeaways are notoriously inconsistent. Coaches can emphasise ball disruption, but no one can ensure it. He is on the ballot because the offensive production is legitimate. 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 team would be several victories worse off. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the foundation is in place for sustained success. However he falls short in this ranking.

4) Liam Coen, His Team, 12-4

The Jaguars' coach is in a similar spot to Johnson. He's a fellow rookie leader who has engineered a dramatic resurgence. Over the stretch run of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the most complete all-around ball of his professional life. And he's also spearheaded the overhaul of a defense that now sits at fifth in the league in EPA per play.

Even more impressively, Coen has nailed the off-field aspects, which wasn't a certainty following his early public introduction and some of his preseason moves.

Coen walked into Jacksonville with an exceptionally inexperienced coaching staff. In contrast to other coaches, who packed their staff with the perfect staff cocktail of new ideas and experience, Coen bet on newbies. Starting with the head coach on down to coordinators to position coaches, the Jags are stocked with rookies. That type of setup is intriguing on paper, but often fails in practice – as past failures are a warning – because everybody is figuring out a new job on the fly. Yet he has pulled everyone and everything together.

Following an early strong beginning, there was a chance that the campaign would veer off the rails. A mid-year collapse caused the Jags wobbling once more. That's usually when leaders overcorrect. Coen didn't. Instead, he simplified the approach. Jacksonville stopped chasing explosive answers and started hunting sustainable ones. Coen recentered the offense around his playmakers and the running game, and encouraged his QB to use his legs more.

The outcomes are clear. The Jags have won seven games consecutively and will be the conference's No 3 playoff seed. He receives the tiniest deduction in the rankings because he inherited a skilled roster, but he has demonstrated he can get the most out of that talent.

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

Each Strong of the Year case has a hinge moment. For Mike Macdonald, it was his QB decision.

Moving on from a veteran, signing a new signal-caller and partnering him with an new offensive coordinator might have derailed the campaign in October. Instead, it made it. Through the mid point of the season, the new QB was an Most Valuable Player front-runner. He has cooled off after that time, slipping to a lower rank in efficiency per pass attempt over the latter part of the schedule, putting him just one spot ahead of peers.

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