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Usually, the NFL's Coach of the Year award follows a simple formula. It often functions as a type of apology. We regret we underestimated your squad in our preseason projections.

In theory, it's a clear-cut trajectory: the coach who engineered the largest improvement receives the prize. In practice, it fuels an annual argument about expectations and whether we're truly honoring excellent coaching or simply the most shocking upset.

Yet the current race is profoundly different. The group of contenders is unusually strong. It has been the season of turnarounds. The NFL has been chaotic, with reigning conference winners fading and recent also-rans ascending together. During an normal year, a coach guiding the Denver Broncos to the top of the conference would make him the clear favorite. But in such a wild and fun year, he's facing multiple other outstanding coaches.

Here is how the ideal vote should look.

5) Ben Johnson, His Team, Their Record

Voters for Coach of the Year selectors love QBs. This is a tradition. A certain coach in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. A third in 2022. Should you transform a quarterback, you're well on your way home.

The Bears' head coach not only fixed his young quarterback; he's unleashed him. Within an ideal environment, the QB has been given the opportunity to showcase his rare talent. Since Week 9, the Chicago offense sit at fourth in offensive Expected Points Added per play. This isn't a lucky run – it's prolonged dominance. With his guidance, the quarterback has become increasingly confident, less reckless, and has willingly submitted to the scheme rather than freelancing. It is an attack designed solely in the coach's image: a physical run game, a steady helping of play-action and a creative passing attack that frees wide receiver receivers all over the field. Williams has taken advantage. And when clear throws weren't available, he's been capable to conjure magic out of broken plays.

The coach arrived to the Bears with a specific offensive philosophy. Virtually each gamble – rebuilding the offensive line, featuring the pass-catchers, transforming the QB into a rhythm passer – has worked. This is rare for a rookie head coach. And it's rarer still for a leader who entered the building with the level of pressure he did. For two straight cycles, he was the top name on the head coaching market. However when it comes to hiring a head coach, there are zero guarantees. Remarkably, he has lived up to the hype – and even surpassed them. He's demonstrated not just to be a offensive wizard but the type of culture builder that can breathe new life into an organization.

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

Where his case comes slightly unstuck is on defense. The Chicago defense currently rank 25th in defensive success rate. They are living on takeaways, and turnovers are famously inconsistent. Defensive minds can focus on creating turnovers, but nobody can guarantee it. He is on the ballot because the offense is real. He's not higher because luck is doing too much of the defensive work. With a couple breaks of the ball, the team would be several wins worse off. It's been an exceptional transformation, and the foundation is in place for sustained winning. However Johnson falls short in this ranking.

4) Liam Coen, His Team, 12-4

Coen is in a comparable situation to his counterpart. He's another first-time head coach who has masterminded a swift turnaround. During the stretch run of the season, he has his franchise quarterback playing the best all-around ball of his professional life. And he's also overseen the overhaul of a defensive unit that now sits at number five in the league in Expected Points Added per play.

What's more notably, he has mastered the leadership stuff, which wasn't a certainty following his initial press conference appearances and some of his preseason moves.

The coach walked into the Jaguars with an uncommonly inexperienced coaching staff. In contrast to Johnson, who packed their staff with the perfect coaching mix of new ideas and experience, he trusted first-timers. Starting with the head coach on down to assistants to position coaches, the Jaguars are filled with first-timers. That type of setup is intriguing on paper, but often collapses in practice – as past failures are a cautionary tale – because everybody is figuring out a their job in real-time. But he has managed to bring everyone and everything into sync.

Following an initial strong start, there was a chance that the season would go off the track. A mid-year collapse caused the team stumbling again. That's typically when coaches overcorrect. Coen didn't. Instead, he simplified the approach. The offense stopped chasing explosive answers and started hunting sustainable ones. The coach refocused the attack around key players and the running game, and encouraged Lawrence to use his legs more.

The outcomes are clear. The Jags have won multiple games in a row and will be the conference's No 3 playoff seed. Coen gets the slightest knock in the standings because he inherited a skilled roster, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that roster.

3) The Seattle Seahawks Coach, Seattle Seahawks, 13-3

Every Coach of the Year narrative has a hinge decision. For the Seahawks coach, it was his QB move.

Moving on from a veteran, bringing in a different signal-caller and pairing him with an new offensive coordinator could have derailed the season in the early weeks. Instead, it defined it. By the mid point of the season, the acquisition was an MVP contender. He has cooled off since that hot streak, dropping to 23rd in EPA per dropback over the latter part of the schedule, placing him just one place ahead of other QBs.

Still