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Typically, the National Football League's Head Coach of the Year award adheres to a straightforward script. It often serves as a kind of mea culpa. Our apologies we underestimated your franchise in our preseason projections.

On paper, it's a clear-cut path: the coach who orchestrated the largest resurgence is handed the prize. In reality, it fuels an annual debate about expectations and whether we're actually honoring excellent leadership or just the greatest upset.

But this year's field is profoundly unique. The group of contenders is unusually deep. It has been the year of comebacks. The league has been unpredictable, with reigning conference winners fading and longtime also-rans improving collectively. In an normal season, Sean Payton leading the Denver Broncos to the summit of the conference would make him the overwhelming favorite. But in such a chaotic and fun year, he's facing five other exceptional candidates.

This is how the projected vote ought to look.

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

Voters for Coach of the Year voters adore quarterbacks. They always have. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. If you transform a quarterback, you're halfway home.

The Bears' head coach didn't merely fixed his young quarterback; he's unlocked him. In the right system, the QB has been afforded the chance to demonstrate his otherworldly talent. From Week 9, the Chicago offense sit at fourth in offensive Expected Points Added per play. That's not a lucky run – it's sustained performance. With Johnson, Williams has become increasingly confident, less careless, and has eagerly submitted to the gameplan rather than freelancing. It is an offense designed solely in the coach's image: a bully-ball ground attack, a steady helping of play-action passes and a innovative passing attack that springs wide receiver targets consistently. The QB has taken advantage. And when openings weren't there, he's been capable to spin big plays out of broken plays.

The coach arrived to Chicago with a specific offensive vision. Almost each bet – overhauling the trenches, utilizing the pass-catchers, transforming Williams into a timing-based passer – has paid off. That's rare for a rookie skipper. And it's even more uncommon still for a coach who entered the organization with the level of pressure Johnson did. For consecutive straight offseasons, he was the hottest candidate on the head coaching market. However when it comes to selecting a head coach, there are zero guarantees. Remarkably, he has met the hype – and even surpassed them. He's proven not only to be a scheme genius but the kind of culture builder that can breathe fresh energy into an organization.

During a ordinary year, he would be the overwhelming favorite. Yet the current is not a normal campaign!

The area where his case runs a bit unstuck is on the defensive side. The Bears currently rank in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are relying on takeaways, and takeaways are famously fickle. Defensive minds can emphasise ball disruption, but no one can guarantee it. He is on the list because the offense is legitimate. He's ranked lower because luck is doing an outsized share of the defense's work. With a few breaks of the ball, the team would be several victories behind. It's been an exceptional transformation, and the foundation is in place for sustained winning. But he falls just short in this ranking.

4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, Their Record

Coen is in a similar position to his counterpart. He's a fellow rookie head coach who has engineered a rapid resurgence. Over the crucial final weeks of the season, he has his franchise quarterback playing the most complete overall ball of his career. And he's also overseen the transformation of a defense that now ranks number five in the NFL in EPA per play.

What's more notably, he has mastered the leadership aspects, which wasn't a certainty following his early press conference appearances and some of his offseason decisions.

Coen took over the Jaguars with an exceptionally raw coaching staff. Unlike other coaches, who packed their staff with the ideal coaching mix of youth and veteran savvy, he hired newbies. Starting with the leader on down to coordinators to position coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with first-timers. That kind of approach is exciting in theory, but often fails in reality – as past failures are a cautionary tale – because everyone is figuring out a their job in real-time. Yet Coen has pulled the entire group and all elements into sync.

Following an initial hot start, there was a risk that the campaign would veer off the track. A mid-year collapse had the Jags stumbling again. That's typically when coaches overcorrect. Coen didn't. Rather, he streamlined things. The offense stopped chasing explosive answers and started hunting reliable ones. Coen recentered the attack around his playmakers and the ground attack, and asked Lawrence to use his mobility more.

The results are evident. The Jaguars have won seven games consecutively and will be the conference's No 3 playoff seed. He gets the slightest knock in the standings because he inherited a talented roster, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that roster.

3) Mike Macdonald, His Team, Their Record

Each Coach of the Year case has a hinge moment. For Mike Macdonald, it was his quarterback choice.

Moving on from a incumbent, bringing in a new quarterback and partnering him with an innovative offensive coordinator could have ended the campaign in October. Instead, it made it. Through the middle point of the year, the new QB was an MVP front-runner. He has regressed since that hot streak, dropping to 23rd in EPA per dropback over the second half of the season, placing him just one spot ahead of other QBs.

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