The Way This Bizarre Campaign Shattered the Typical NFL Coach of the Year Mould.

Typically, the National Football League's Coach of the Year award adheres to a straightforward pattern. It commonly serves as a type of apology. We regret we underestimated your team in our pre-campaign predictions.

In theory, it's a clear-cut path: the coach who engineered the largest turnaround is handed the prize. In practice, it sparks an annual debate about expectations and whether we're truly honoring superior leadership or merely the most shocking surprise.

Yet the current competition is profoundly different. The group of contenders is exceptionally strong. It has been the season of comebacks. The league has been chaotic, with reigning division champions fading and longtime strugglers ascending collectively. During an ordinary year, Sean Payton leading the Denver Broncos to the top of the AFC would make him the stone-cold front-runner. Yet in such a turbulent and thrilling year, he's facing several other elite coaches.

Below is how the hypothetical vote could be structured.

5) Ben Johnson, His Team, 11-5

Coach of the Year voters love quarterbacks. This is a tradition. A certain coach in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. When you fix a quarterback, you're well on your way home.

The Bears' head coach hasn't just fixed his young quarterback; he's unlocked him. Given a proper environment, Williams has been afforded the opportunity to showcase his otherworldly ability. Since midseason onward, the Chicago offense rank number four in offensive Expected Points Added per play. That's not a brief surge – it's consistent excellence. Under Johnson, the quarterback has become more confident, less reckless, and has eagerly submitted to the system rather than going rogue. It is an offense built solely in Johnson's image: a physical ground attack, a steady dose of play-action passes and a creative passing attack that springs wide receiver targets consistently. The QB has taken advantage. And when openings weren't available, he's been capable to spin big plays from broken plays.

The coach came to Chicago with a specific offensive vision. Virtually each decision – overhauling the trenches, utilizing the pass-catchers, turning Williams into a rhythm passer – has paid off. That's rare for a rookie skipper. And it's rarer yet for a leader who entered the building with the level of expectations Johnson did. For consecutive straight offseasons, he was the top name on the head coaching market. But when it comes to hiring a leader, there are no sure things. Remarkably, Johnson has met the hype – and even surpassed them. He's proven not only to be a scheme dork but the type of culture builder that can inject fresh energy into an organization.

In a normal season, Johnson would be the runaway favorite. But the current is not a normal campaign!

Where his case runs slightly into trouble is on the defensive side. The Bears currently rank 25th in defensive efficiency. They are surviving on takeaways, and takeaways are famously unreliable. Coaches can stress creating turnovers, but no one can ensure it. He is on the ballot because the offensive production is real. He's ranked lower because variance is doing too much of the defensive work. With a few bounces of the ball, the team would be several wins behind. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the foundation is established for long-term success. However he falls just short in this ranking.

4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, 12-4

The Jaguars' coach is in a comparable situation to Johnson. He's a fellow first-time head coach who has orchestrated a dramatic resurgence. Over the stretch run of the season, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the most complete all-around football of his career. And he's also spearheaded the remaking of a defensive unit that now ranks number five in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.

What's more notably, he has mastered the leadership stuff, which was not a given following his initial public introduction and some of his offseason decisions.

The coach took over Jacksonville with an exceptionally inexperienced coaching staff. In contrast to Johnson, who surrounded themselves with the ideal coaching mix of new ideas and veteran savvy, Coen bet on newbies. Starting with the leader on down to assistants to assistant coaches, the Jags are stocked with first-timers. That kind of setup is intriguing in theory, but frequently fails in practice – as past failures are a warning – because everyone is figuring out a new job on the fly. But Coen has managed to bring everyone and everything together.

After an initial strong beginning, there was a risk that the campaign would veer off the track. A mid-year collapse caused the team stumbling again. That's usually when coaches panic and change too much. He did not. Instead, he simplified the approach. The offense stopped pursuing home-run plays and started hunting reliable ones. The coach refocused the attack around his playmakers and the running game, and asked his QB to use his mobility more often.

The results are obvious. The Jaguars have won seven games consecutively and will be the AFC's number three seed. He gets the slightest deduction in the standings because he inherited a skilled team, but he has demonstrated he can get the most out of that roster.

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

Each Strong of the Year case has a hinge moment. For the Seahawks coach, it was his quarterback move.

Parting ways from a incumbent, bringing in a different signal-caller and partnering him with an new offensive coordinator could have derailed the campaign in the early weeks. Rather, it made it. Through the middle point of the year, the new QB was an MVP candidate. He has cooled off after that time, slipping to 23rd in efficiency per pass attempt over the second half of the season, placing him just one spot ahead of other QBs.

Still