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Typically, the National Football League's Coach of the Year trophy adheres to a simple formula. It frequently acts as a kind of mea culpa. Our apologies we underestimated your franchise in our pre-campaign predictions.

In theory, it's a direct path: the coach who orchestrated the largest resurgence is handed the award. However, it fuels an yearly discussion about expectations and whether we're actually honoring excellent leadership or merely the greatest upset.

Yet this year's field is profoundly different. The list of nominees is unusually deep. It has been the year of comebacks. The league has been chaotic, with recent division winners declining and longtime strugglers ascending collectively. In an typical year, a coach guiding the his team to the top of the conference would make him the overwhelming front-runner. Yet in such a turbulent and thrilling season, he's competing with several other outstanding coaches.

This is how the hypothetical vote should look.

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

Voters for Coach of the Year voters are fascinated by quarterbacks. This is a tradition. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. Should you solve a quarterback, you're halfway home.

Ben Johnson not only corrected his young quarterback; he's unleashed him. Given a proper environment, Williams has been given the chance to demonstrate his special ability. Since midseason onward, the Chicago offense rank number four in offensive Expected Points Added per play. This isn't a lucky run – it's consistent performance. Under Johnson, the quarterback has become more confident, less careless, and has willingly submitted to the scheme instead of going rogue. It is an attack built entirely in the coach's vision: a bully-ball ground attack, a consistent dose of play-action and a imaginative aerial game that frees wide-open targets all over the field. The QB has thrived. And when easy reads weren't available, he's been able to spin big plays from nothing.

The coach arrived to Chicago with a specific offensive vision. Almost every gamble – rebuilding the offensive line, highlighting the tight ends, transforming the QB into a timing-based passer – has succeeded. That's rare for a first-year head coach. And it's even more uncommon yet for a leader who entered the organization with the level of hype Johnson did. For two straight offseasons, he was the hottest candidate on the head coaching carousel. However when it comes to hiring 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 scheme dork but the kind of leader that can inject fresh energy into an organization.

In a ordinary season, Johnson would be the clear-cut favorite. Yet the current isn't a typical season!

The area where Johnson's case runs a bit unstuck is on defense. The Bears presently rank in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are surviving on turnovers, and takeaways are famously fickle. Defensive minds can stress ball disruption, but no one can guarantee it. He is on the ballot because the offense is sustainable. He's not higher because luck is doing too much of the defensive heavy lifting. With a couple breaks of the ball, the Bears would be several wins behind. It's been an exceptional transformation, and the core is established for long-term winning. However he comes up just short here.

4) The Jacksonville Jaguars Coach, Jacksonville Jaguars, 12-4

Coen is in a similar situation to Johnson. He's a fellow first-time leader who has masterminded a swift turnaround. During the stretch run of the year, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the best all-around ball of his career. And he's also spearheaded the overhaul of a defense that now ranks number five in the league in EPA per play.

What's more impressively, he has excelled at the leadership stuff, which was not a given following his initial press conference appearances and some of his preseason decisions.

Coen walked into Jacksonville with an uncommonly inexperienced staff. In contrast to other coaches, who surrounded their staff with the ideal staff blend of new ideas and veteran savvy, he hired first-timers. From the head coach on down to assistants to assistant coaches, the Jaguars are filled with rookies. That type of setup is exciting in theory, but often collapses in practice – as past failures are a cautionary tale – because everybody is learning a their job in real-time. Yet he has pulled the entire group and all elements together.

Following an initial hot beginning, there was a chance that the campaign would go off the rails. A mid-year setback had the Jags wobbling once more. That's usually when coaches overcorrect. He did not. Instead, he streamlined the approach. Jacksonville stopped pursuing explosive answers and started seeking consistent ones. The coach refocused the offense around his playmakers and the running game, and encouraged his QB to use his mobility more often.

The outcomes are clear. The Jaguars have won multiple games in a row and will be the conference's number three seed. He gets the slightest deduction in the standings because he took over a talented team, but he has proven he can get the most out of that talent.

3) Mike Macdonald, Seattle Seahawks, Their Record

Every Strong of the Year narrative has a defining moment. For the Seahawks coach, it was his quarterback move.

Parting ways from a veteran, signing a different quarterback and partnering him with an new play-caller might have derailed the season in October. Instead, it made it. By the mid point of the year, the new QB was an Most Valuable Player front-runner. He has cooled off after that hot streak, slipping to a lower rank in EPA per dropback over the latter part of the season, putting him only a single place ahead of peers.

Still