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Usually, the NFL's Head Coach of the Year award adheres to a straightforward pattern. It often serves as a kind of apology. We regret we misjudged your squad in our pre-campaign projections.

Theoretically, it's a clear-cut line: the coach who engineered the largest resurgence wins the prize. In practice, it creates an yearly discussion about preseason outlooks and whether we're truly honoring excellent coaching or simply the biggest shock.

Yet the current field is fundamentally different. The list of candidates is remarkably deep. It has been the campaign of resurgences. The NFL has been messy, with recent division winners declining and longtime underperformers ascending collectively. In an typical season, Sean Payton leading the Denver Broncos to the top of the AFC would make him the overwhelming front-runner. Yet in this chaotic and thrilling season, he's facing five other exceptional candidates.

This is how the projected ballot could look.

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

Voters for Coach of the Year selectors are fascinated by quarterbacks. They always have. A certain coach in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. If you solve a quarterback, you're halfway to winning the award.

Ben Johnson hasn't just corrected his young quarterback; he's unlocked him. Within an ideal ecosystem, the QB has been afforded the chance to display his otherworldly ability. From midseason onward, the Bears sit at fourth in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a hot streak – it's prolonged excellence. Under Johnson, the quarterback has become more confident, less careless, and has willingly surrendered to the gameplan instead of improvising. It is an attack constructed solely in the coach's image: a physical ground attack, a steady dose of play-action passes and a creative passing attack that frees wide receiver receivers consistently. Williams has capitalized. And when easy reads weren't there, he's been capable to conjure magic out of nothing.

The coach arrived to the Bears with a clear offensive blueprint. Almost each decision – overhauling the offensive line, highlighting the pass-catchers, turning Williams into a timing-based thrower – has succeeded. This is uncommon for a rookie head coach. And it's even more uncommon still for a leader who entered the building with the kind of hype Johnson did. For two straight offseasons, he was the top name on the head coaching carousel. However when it comes to hiring a head coach, there are zero guarantees. Somehow, he has lived up to expectations – and even surpassed them. He's demonstrated not only to be a offensive dork but the type of leader that can breathe fresh energy into an organization.

In a ordinary season, Johnson would be the overwhelming choice. Yet this is not a typical year!

Where his candidacy comes slightly unstuck is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense presently sit in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are relying on turnovers, and turnovers are notoriously unreliable. Defensive minds can stress creating turnovers, but no one can guarantee it. He is on the list because the offensive production is real. He's not higher because luck is doing too much of the defensive heavy lifting. If not for a few breaks of the ball, the Bears would be several wins behind. It's been an exceptional transformation, and the foundation is in place for long-term winning. But he comes up short in this ranking.

4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, Their Record

Coen is in a similar situation to Johnson. He's another rookie leader who has engineered a rapid turnaround. During the crucial final weeks of the season, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the most complete all-around football of his career. And he's also spearheaded the transformation of a defense that now ranks fifth in the league in Expected Points Added per play.

Even more notably, Coen has nailed the intangibles stuff, which was not a certainty following his initial press conference appearances and some of his offseason decisions.

The coach took over Jacksonville with an exceptionally inexperienced staff. In contrast to other coaches, who packed themselves with the perfect staff blend of new ideas and experience, Coen trusted first-timers. Starting with the head coach on down to assistants to position coaches, the Jaguars are filled with rookies. That type of setup is exciting in theory, but frequently collapses in reality – with other teams are a cautionary tale – because everyone is figuring out a their job in real-time. But he has pulled the entire group and everything into sync.

Following an initial hot beginning, there was a possibility that the season would go off the rails. A midseason setback had the Jags stumbling once more. That's usually when leaders panic and change too much. Coen didn't. Rather, he simplified things. Jacksonville stopped pursuing explosive plays and started seeking reliable ones. Coen refocused the offense around key players and the ground attack, and encouraged his QB to use his mobility more.

The outcomes are evident. The Jags have won multiple games consecutively and will be the conference's No 3 seed. He gets the slightest knock in the rankings because he inherited a skilled team, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that roster.

3) Mike Macdonald, His Team, 13-3

Every Coach of the Year argument has a defining decision. For Mike Macdonald, it was his quarterback decision.

Parting ways from a incumbent, bringing in a new signal-caller and partnering him with an new offensive coordinator could have ended the campaign in October. Rather, it made it. Through the middle point of the season, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player candidate. He has fallen away since that time, slipping to 23rd in EPA per dropback over the second half of the season, placing him only a single spot ahead of other QBs.

Still