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Usually, the National Football League's Coach of the Year award adheres to a straightforward formula. It commonly functions as a form of mea culpa. Our apologies we misjudged your team in our preseason forecasts.

On paper, it's a clear-cut path: the coach who engineered the biggest turnaround receives the prize. However, it creates an annual debate about preseason outlooks and whether we're genuinely honoring superior coaching or just the greatest surprise.

However the latest field is fundamentally different. The list of candidates is exceptionally deep. It has been the year of comebacks. The NFL has been chaotic, with reigning division champions falling away and longtime underperformers improving together. During an ordinary year, Sean Payton guiding the Denver Broncos to the top of the conference would make him the stone-cold favorite. But in such a turbulent and entertaining year, he's facing several other outstanding coaches.

This is how the ideal ballot ought to look.

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

Voters for Coach of the Year selectors adore signal-callers. They always have. A certain coach in 2017. Another in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. Should you transform a franchise QB, you're halfway to winning the award.

The Bears' head coach not only corrected Caleb Williams; he's freed him. Given a proper ecosystem, Williams has been given the opportunity to demonstrate his special talent. Since Week 9, the Bears sit at fourth in offensive Expected Points Added per play. That's not a brief surge – it's prolonged excellence. With his guidance, the quarterback has become increasingly decisive, less reckless, and has eagerly submitted to the gameplan instead of freelancing. It is an attack designed solely in Johnson's vision: a physical ground attack, a consistent dose of play-action and a creative passing attack that creates wide receiver receivers all over the field. Williams has capitalized. And when openings haven't been available, he's been capable to conjure magic from nothing.

Johnson arrived to the Bears with a defined offensive vision. Almost every bet – rebuilding the trenches, highlighting the tight ends, transforming the QB into a timing-based thrower – has paid off. This is rare for a first-year skipper. And it's even more uncommon still for a coach who walked into the building with the kind of pressure Johnson did. For consecutive straight cycles, he was the most sought-after candidate on the head coaching market. But when it comes to hiring a head coach, there are zero guarantees. Remarkably, he has lived up to the hype – and even exceeded them. He's demonstrated not just to be a offensive genius but the kind of leader that can breathe new life into an organization.

In a ordinary season, Johnson would be the runaway favorite. But the current isn't a normal season!

Where Johnson's case comes slightly unstuck is on the defensive side. The Bears currently rank in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are relying on takeaways, and turnovers are notoriously unreliable. Defensive minds can focus on creating turnovers, but no one can ensure it. Johnson is on the list because the offensive production is real. He's not higher because luck is doing an outsized share of the defense's heavy lifting. With a few bounces of the ball, the Bears would be several victories worse off. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the core is in place for long-term winning. However he comes up short in this ranking.

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

Coen is in a similar situation to Johnson. He's another first-time leader who has masterminded a dramatic resurgence. During the stretch run of the season, he has his franchise quarterback playing the most complete all-around football of his career. And he's also spearheaded the remaking of a defense that now ranks fifth in the league in Expected Points Added per play.

What's more notably, he has excelled at the off-field aspects, which wasn't a given following his initial public appearances and some of his preseason decisions.

The coach took over the Jaguars with an uncommonly raw coaching staff. In contrast to Johnson, who packed themselves with the ideal coaching mix of new ideas and experience, Coen bet on first-timers. Starting with the leader on down to assistants to position coaches, the Jags are filled with rookies. That type of setup is intriguing in theory, but frequently collapses in practice – as past failures are a cautionary tale – because everybody is figuring out a their job in real-time. Yet Coen has pulled everyone and everything into sync.

Following an initial strong beginning, there was a chance that the campaign would veer off the rails. A midseason setback had the Jags stumbling again. That's usually when leaders panic and change too much. He did not. Instead, he simplified things. The offense stopped chasing home-run plays and started hunting sustainable ones. The coach recentered the offense around his playmakers and the ground attack, and asked his QB to use his legs more.

The outcomes are clear. The Jaguars have won seven games in a row and will be the AFC's No 3 playoff seed. Coen gets the tiniest deduction in the standings because he took over a skilled roster, but he has proven he can get the most out of that roster.

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

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

Parting ways from a veteran, signing a new quarterback and partnering him with an new offensive coordinator might have derailed the season in the early weeks. Rather, it made it. Through the mid point of the year, the acquisition was an MVP front-runner. He has regressed since that time, dropping to 23rd in efficiency per pass attempt over the second half of the schedule, placing him only a single place ahead of peers.

Still