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Usually, the National Football League's Head Coach of the Year trophy follows a simple pattern. It often acts as a type of mea culpa. Our apologies we underestimated your franchise in our preseason projections.

On paper, it's a direct trajectory: the skipper who oversaw the largest turnaround receives the award. In reality, it creates an yearly argument about expectations and whether we're truly rewarding superior leadership or just the greatest shock.

Yet the latest race is fundamentally different. The list of nominees is remarkably strong. It has been the season of resurgences. The NFL has been messy, with recent conference champions fading and recent strugglers rising collectively. In an ordinary year, a coach leading the Denver Broncos to the summit of the AFC would make him the overwhelming front-runner. But in such a chaotic and entertaining year, he's competing with multiple other outstanding candidates.

This is how the projected ballot could shake out.

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

Voters for Coach of the Year voters love quarterbacks. They always have. A certain coach in 2017. Another in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. Should you fix a quarterback, you're halfway to winning the award.

The Bears' head coach not only fixed his young quarterback; he's unleashed him. Given a proper environment, the QB has been given the opportunity to showcase his special ability. From Week 9, the Bears sit at number four in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a brief surge – it's prolonged dominance. With Johnson, Williams has become increasingly decisive, far less reckless, and has eagerly submitted to the system instead of going rogue. It is an offense constructed entirely in the coach's image: a bully-ball ground attack, a heavy dose of play-action passes and a creative aerial game that creates wide receiver targets all over the field. Williams has capitalized. And when easy reads weren't available, he's been capable to create big plays out of nothing.

Johnson arrived to the Bears with a clear offensive vision. Virtually every gamble – overhauling the offensive line, utilizing the tight ends, transforming the QB into a timing-based thrower – has succeeded. That's uncommon for a rookie skipper. And it's even more uncommon yet for a coach who walked into the organization with the immense hype he did. For consecutive straight cycles, he was the hottest name on the head coaching carousel. However when it comes to selecting a leader, there are no guarantees. Somehow, Johnson has met expectations – and even surpassed them. He's proven not just to be a scheme dork but the kind of culture builder that can inject fresh energy into an organization.

In a typical season, he would be the clear-cut choice. But this isn't a typical campaign!

Where Johnson's case comes a bit into trouble is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense currently rank in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are living on turnovers, and turnovers are notoriously inconsistent. Defensive minds can focus on creating turnovers, but no one can guarantee it. He is on the ballot because the offensive production is legitimate. He's not higher because luck is doing too much of the defensive work. With a few breaks of the ball, the Bears would be two wins worse off. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the foundation is in place for sustained success. However Johnson comes up just short in this ranking.

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

The Jaguars' coach is in a comparable spot to Johnson. He's another rookie leader who has engineered a rapid turnaround. During the crucial final weeks of the season, he has his franchise quarterback playing the finest all-around ball of his career. And he's also spearheaded the overhaul of a defensive unit that now sits at fifth in the league in EPA per play.

What's more impressively, Coen has excelled at the off-field stuff, which was not a given following his initial press conference introduction and some of his preseason moves.

Coen took over the Jaguars with an uncommonly raw coaching staff. In contrast to other coaches, who packed themselves with the ideal coaching mix of new ideas and experience, Coen hired first-timers. Starting with the head coach himself to coordinators to position coaches, the Jaguars are filled with first-timers. That kind of setup is exciting in theory, but often fails in reality – as past failures are a warning – because everybody is figuring out a their job in real-time. Yet 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 track. A mid-year collapse caused the Jags stumbling once more. That's typically when leaders overcorrect. Coen didn't. Instead, he streamlined things. The offense stopped chasing home-run answers and started seeking reliable ones. The coach recentered the offense around his playmakers and the ground attack, and asked Lawrence to use his mobility more.

The results are clear. The Jags have won multiple games consecutively and will be the conference's number three playoff seed. Coen receives the slightest deduction in the standings because he inherited a talented roster, but he has demonstrated he can get the most out of that talent.

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

Each Coach of the Year case has a pivotal decision. For the Seahawks coach, it was his quarterback choice.

Parting ways from a incumbent, signing a different signal-caller and partnering him with an innovative play-caller might have ended the campaign in the early weeks. Instead, it shaped it. By the mid point of the season, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player candidate. He has regressed after that hot streak, dropping to 23rd in efficiency per pass attempt over the latter part of the schedule, putting him only one spot ahead of peers.

Still