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Typically, the National Football League's Coach of the Year award adheres to a straightforward script. It often functions as a kind of apology. We regret we got wrong your squad in our preseason predictions.

On paper, it's a direct line: the skipper who orchestrated the largest improvement wins the prize. In practice, it fuels an annual discussion about preseason outlooks and whether we're actually honoring superior leadership or merely the most shocking surprise.

Yet the current competition is fundamentally unique. The group of candidates is unusually talented. It has been the season of comebacks. The league has been messy, with recent conference champions fading and longtime strugglers improving collectively. Under an ordinary year, a coach leading the his team to the summit of the conference would make him the stone-cold favorite. Yet in such a turbulent and fun season, he's competing with five other exceptional candidates.

This is how the projected vote could be structured.

5) Ben Johnson, Chicago Bears, Their Record

Coach of the Year voters adore signal-callers. This is a tradition. Sean McVay in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. A third in 2022. If you transform a quarterback, you're halfway to winning the award.

Ben Johnson not only fixed his young quarterback; he's freed him. Within an ideal environment, Williams has been given the opportunity to display his rare ability. From Week 9, the Bears sit at fourth in offensive Expected Points Added per play. That's not a hot streak – it's sustained performance. Under his guidance, the quarterback has become increasingly confident, far less reckless, and has willingly surrendered to the gameplan instead of going rogue. It is an attack designed solely in Johnson's image: a bully-ball ground attack, a consistent dose of play-action and a innovative aerial game that springs wide receiver receivers consistently. Williams has capitalized. And when openings weren't there, he's been able to conjure big plays out of broken plays.

The coach arrived to Chicago with a clear offensive blueprint. Almost every gamble – overhauling the offensive line, utilizing the tight ends, transforming the QB into a rhythm thrower – has succeeded. That's uncommon for a rookie head coach. And it's even more uncommon yet for a leader who walked into the organization with the kind of expectations he did. For consecutive straight cycles, he was the top candidate on the head coaching market. But when it comes to selecting a head coach, there are zero guarantees. Remarkably, Johnson has met expectations – and even surpassed them. He's demonstrated not just to be a scheme wizard but the type of culture builder that can inject fresh energy into an franchise.

In a ordinary year, he would be the overwhelming choice. Yet the current isn't a normal year!

Where Johnson's case comes a bit into trouble is on defense. The Chicago defense currently rank in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are surviving on takeaways, and takeaways are notoriously fickle. Coaches can focus on ball disruption, but nobody can guarantee it. Johnson is on the list because the offensive production is sustainable. He's ranked lower because variance is doing an outsized share of the defensive heavy lifting. If not for a few breaks of the ball, the Bears would be two victories worse off. It's been an exceptional turnaround, and the foundation is established for sustained winning. However he comes up just short here.

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

The Jaguars' coach is in a similar position to Johnson. He's another first-time head coach who has engineered a swift resurgence. Over the stretch run of the year, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the finest overall ball of his professional life. And he's also overseen the overhaul of a defensive unit that now ranks number five in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.

Even more impressively, Coen has mastered the intangibles aspects, which wasn't a guarantee following his initial press conference introduction and some of his offseason moves.

Coen walked into the Jaguars with an uncommonly raw coaching staff. In contrast to other coaches, who packed their staff with the perfect coaching mix of youth and veteran savvy, Coen bet on newbies. From the head coach himself to coordinators to position coaches, the Jags are filled with first-timers. That kind of approach is intriguing in theory, but often fails in reality – as past failures are a cautionary tale – because everyone is learning a new job on the fly. Yet he has pulled everyone and all elements into sync.

After an early hot start, there was a risk that the campaign would veer off the rails. A mid-year setback had the Jags wobbling again. That's usually when coaches panic and change too much. He didn't. Rather, he streamlined things. The offense stopped chasing explosive plays and started hunting reliable ones. Coen recentered the offense around key players and the ground attack, and encouraged Lawrence to use his legs more.

The results are obvious. The Jags have won seven games in a row and will be the AFC's No 3 playoff seed. He gets the tiniest knock in the standings because he inherited a talented team, but he has proven he can get the most out of that roster.

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

Each Strong of the Year narrative has a hinge decision. For Mike Macdonald, it was his quarterback decision.

Moving on from a veteran, bringing in a different quarterback and partnering him with an innovative offensive coordinator could have ended the season in the early weeks. Rather, it shaped it. Through the mid point of the season, the acquisition was an MVP contender. He has cooled off after that time, slipping to a lower rank in efficiency per pass attempt over the second half of the season, placing him just a single spot ahead of peers.

Still