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Ordinarily, the National Football League's Coach of the Year trophy follows a simple pattern. It frequently acts as a type of mea culpa. Sorry we underestimated your team in our pre-campaign forecasts.

Theoretically, it's a clear-cut trajectory: the coach who orchestrated the biggest resurgence receives the prize. In practice, it fuels an yearly argument about preseason outlooks and whether we're genuinely honoring superior coaching or just the greatest upset.

However this year's competition is distinctly different. The group of candidates is unusually deep. It has been the campaign of turnarounds. The league has been messy, with recent division champions declining and longtime underperformers ascending collectively. During an normal year, a coach leading the his team to the top of the AFC would make him the overwhelming front-runner. Yet in such a turbulent and entertaining season, he's up against multiple other exceptional candidates.

Here is how the projected ballot ought to look.

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

Voters for Coach of the Year voters are fascinated by QBs. This is a tradition. Sean McVay in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. If you solve a quarterback, you're well on your way home.

Ben Johnson didn't merely fixed Caleb Williams; he's freed him. Given a proper environment, Williams has been afforded the opportunity to demonstrate his special ability. Since Week 9, the Chicago offense sit at fourth in offensive EPA per play. That's not a lucky run – it's sustained dominance. Under his guidance, the quarterback has become increasingly confident, far less reckless, and has eagerly surrendered to the gameplan rather than going rogue. It is an offense built solely in Johnson's image: a bully-ball ground attack, a heavy dose of play-action and a creative aerial game that creates wide receiver targets everywhere. Williams has taken advantage. And when easy reads haven't been there, he's been able to conjure big plays from nothing.

Johnson came to the Bears with a defined offensive vision. Virtually every bet – rebuilding the offensive line, highlighting the pass-catchers, turning the QB into a rhythm thrower – has worked. This is uncommon for a first-year head coach. And it's rarer yet for a leader who walked into the building with the immense hype he did. For consecutive straight cycles, he was the hottest name on the coaching carousel. However when it comes to selecting a leader, there are zero guarantees. Somehow, Johnson has lived up to the hype – and even surpassed them. He's proven not only to be a offensive genius but the kind of culture builder that can breathe fresh energy into an organization.

During a normal year, Johnson would be the overwhelming choice. But this isn't a typical campaign!

Where Johnson's case comes a bit unstuck is on the defensive side. The Bears presently rank in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are living on turnovers, and turnovers are famously unreliable. Defensive minds can stress ball disruption, but no one can guarantee it. Johnson is on the ballot because the offensive production is legitimate. He's not higher because variance is doing too much of the defensive heavy lifting. With a couple breaks of the ball, the Bears would be two wins worse off. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the core is in place for sustained success. But Johnson falls short here.

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

The Jaguars' coach is in a similar spot to his counterpart. He's a fellow first-time leader who has orchestrated a rapid turnaround. During the stretch run of the season, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the finest overall ball of his career. And he's also spearheaded the overhaul of a defense that now sits at number five in the league in EPA per play.

What's more notably, Coen has excelled at the leadership stuff, which was not a certainty following his early public appearances and some of his offseason decisions.

Coen took over the Jaguars with an uncommonly raw coaching staff. Unlike other coaches, who surrounded their staff with the ideal coaching blend of youth and veteran savvy, he bet on newbies. Starting with the leader himself to assistants to position coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with rookies. That type of approach is intriguing in theory, but often collapses in practice – as past failures are a warning – because everyone is figuring out a new job on the fly. But Coen has pulled everyone and all elements into sync.

Following an initial hot start, there was a risk that the campaign would go off the rails. A mid-year collapse caused the Jags stumbling once more. That's usually when coaches overcorrect. He did not. Instead, he streamlined things. The offense stopped pursuing home-run plays and started seeking sustainable ones. The coach refocused the attack around key players and the running game, and asked his QB to use his legs more often.

The outcomes are obvious. The Jags have won multiple games consecutively and will be the AFC's number three seed. Coen gets the tiniest deduction in the standings because he inherited a skilled roster, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that talent.

3) Mike Macdonald, His Team, 13-3

Every Strong of the Year case has a defining moment. For Mike Macdonald, it was his quarterback choice.

Moving on from a veteran, signing a different signal-caller and pairing him with an new offensive coordinator might have derailed the campaign in the early weeks. Instead, it defined it. By the middle point of the season, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player candidate. He has regressed since that hot streak, slipping to 23rd in EPA per pass attempt over the second half of the season, placing him just a single place ahead of other QBs.

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