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Usually, the National Football League's Coach of the Year trophy adheres to a straightforward pattern. It often acts as a form of mea culpa. We regret we got wrong your team in our preseason predictions.

Theoretically, it's a clear-cut path: the skipper who orchestrated the biggest improvement wins the prize. In practice, it fuels an annual argument about expectations and whether we're truly rewarding excellent coaching or simply the greatest shock.

But the current field is fundamentally unique. The list of candidates is exceptionally deep. It has been the season of comebacks. The league has been chaotic, with reigning conference champions falling away and recent underperformers rising together. In an typical season, Sean Payton leading the his team to the summit of the conference would make him the clear front-runner. Yet in such a chaotic and entertaining year, he's competing with several other outstanding coaches.

Here is how the ideal vote ought to shake out.

5) Ben Johnson, Chicago Bears, Their Record

Voters for Coach of the Year voters are fascinated by quarterbacks. History shows this. Sean McVay in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. A third in 2022. When you solve a franchise QB, you're well on your way home.

The Bears' head coach not only fixed Caleb Williams; he's unlocked him. In the right system, Williams has been given the chance to display his rare talent. From Week 9, the Chicago offense rank number four in offensive EPA per play. That's not a lucky run – it's sustained dominance. Under Johnson, the quarterback has become more decisive, less reckless, and has eagerly submitted to the system instead of freelancing. It is an offense built solely in the coach's image: a bully-ball run game, a consistent dose of play-action passes and a innovative aerial game that springs wide receiver targets consistently. Williams has capitalized. And when easy reads weren't available, he's been capable to create big plays from nothing.

Johnson came to Chicago with a defined offensive philosophy. Almost each bet – overhauling the offensive line, highlighting the tight ends, turning Williams into a timing-based passer – has worked. This is rare for a first-year head coach. And it's even more uncommon still for a coach who entered the organization with the level of expectations he did. For consecutive straight cycles, he was the most sought-after name on the coaching market. However when it comes to selecting a head coach, there are no guarantees. Remarkably, Johnson has lived up to the hype – and even exceeded them. He's demonstrated not only to be a scheme genius but the kind of leader that can breathe fresh energy into an franchise.

During a ordinary season, he would be the runaway choice. Yet this is not a typical season!

The area where his candidacy runs slightly unstuck is on defense. The Chicago defense currently sit in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are surviving on turnovers, and turnovers are notoriously fickle. Coaches can focus on ball disruption, but no one can ensure it. He is on the list because the offense is real. He's not higher because luck is doing an outsized share of the defensive heavy lifting. With a couple bounces of the ball, the Bears would be several victories behind. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the core is in place for sustained success. However Johnson falls just short in this ranking.

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

Coen is in a similar spot to Johnson. He's a fellow first-time head coach who has engineered a swift turnaround. Over the crucial final weeks of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the best overall football of his career. And he's also overseen the overhaul of a defensive unit that now ranks fifth in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.

Even more impressively, he has excelled at the intangibles aspects, which was not a guarantee following his early press conference introduction and some of his offseason decisions.

The coach took over the Jaguars with an uncommonly raw coaching staff. Unlike Johnson, who packed themselves with the ideal coaching blend of youth and veteran savvy, he trusted first-timers. Starting with the head coach on down to assistants to position coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with first-timers. That type of approach is exciting on paper, but often fails in practice – as past failures are a cautionary tale – because everyone is learning a new job in real-time. But he has pulled everyone and all elements into sync.

After an early hot beginning, there was a chance that the campaign would veer off the track. A midseason setback caused the Jags stumbling once more. That's typically when leaders overcorrect. Coen didn't. Rather, he streamlined the approach. The offense stopped chasing explosive answers and started seeking consistent ones. Coen refocused the attack around key players and the ground attack, and encouraged his QB to use his mobility more often.

The results are clear. The Jaguars have won multiple games consecutively and will be the conference's No 3 playoff seed. Coen gets the tiniest deduction in the standings because he inherited a skilled roster, but he has proven he can maximize that roster.

3) Mike Macdonald, Seattle Seahawks, Their Record

Every Coach of the Year narrative has a pivotal decision. For Mike Macdonald, it was his QB choice.

Parting ways from a veteran, bringing in a different signal-caller and pairing him with an innovative offensive coordinator might have ended the campaign in October. Instead, it made it. Through the middle point of the year, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player contender. He has cooled off since that hot streak, slipping to 23rd in EPA per dropback over the latter part of the season, placing him only one spot ahead of other QBs.

Still