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Typically, the National Football League's Head Coach of the Year award adheres to a straightforward formula. It often functions as a form of mea culpa. Our apologies we got wrong your squad in our pre-campaign predictions.

Theoretically, it's a clear-cut trajectory: the coach who oversaw the biggest improvement is handed the award. In practice, it creates an yearly debate about preseason outlooks and whether we're truly honoring excellent coaching or simply the greatest surprise.

But the latest race is fundamentally unique. The group of contenders is exceptionally talented. It has been the year of comebacks. The league has been messy, with recent division champions fading and recent also-rans rising together. Under an normal season, Sean Payton guiding the his team to the summit of the conference would make him the clear front-runner. Yet in this turbulent and fun season, he's competing with multiple other outstanding coaches.

Here is how the ideal vote could be structured.

5) Ben Johnson, His Team, Their Record

Voters for Coach of the Year voters love quarterbacks. This is a tradition. A certain coach in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. Should you solve a quarterback, you're halfway to winning the award.

Ben Johnson didn't merely corrected Caleb Williams; he's unleashed him. Given a proper environment, Williams has been given the chance to showcase his otherworldly ability. Since Week 9, the Bears sit at number four in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a hot streak – it's consistent dominance. With Johnson, the quarterback has become more confident, far less careless, and has eagerly submitted to the system instead of improvising. It is an offense built solely in the coach's image: a bully-ball run game, a steady helping of play-action and a imaginative passing attack that creates wide-open targets everywhere. Williams has taken advantage. And when clear throws weren't available, he's been capable to create big plays from nothing.

The coach came to Chicago with a clear offensive blueprint. Virtually every gamble – rebuilding the trenches, featuring the tight ends, turning Williams into a rhythm thrower – has paid off. This is uncommon for a rookie skipper. And it's even more uncommon yet for a leader who walked into the building with the kind of expectations Johnson did. For consecutive straight offseasons, he was the most sought-after name on the coaching market. However when it comes to selecting a leader, there are no sure things. Remarkably, he has met the hype – and even surpassed them. He's demonstrated not just to be a scheme wizard but the kind of culture builder that can inject fresh energy into an organization.

In a typical year, Johnson would be the runaway choice. Yet this isn't a typical campaign!

The area where his candidacy runs a bit into trouble is on defense. The Bears presently sit in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are surviving on takeaways, and turnovers are notoriously fickle. Coaches can emphasise creating turnovers, but nobody can guarantee it. He is on the list because the offense is legitimate. He's not higher because luck is doing an outsized share of the defensive work. If not for a couple bounces of the ball, the team would be several wins worse off. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the foundation is in place for sustained success. However Johnson comes up just short in this ranking.

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

The Jaguars' coach is in a similar position to his counterpart. He's another rookie head coach who has orchestrated a rapid turnaround. Over the crucial final weeks of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the most complete all-around football of his career. And he's also overseen the overhaul of a defense that now sits at fifth in the league in EPA per play.

What's more impressively, Coen has mastered the leadership aspects, which wasn't a certainty after his early public appearances and some of his offseason decisions.

The coach took over Jacksonville with an exceptionally inexperienced coaching staff. Unlike Johnson, who packed themselves with the perfect staff blend of new ideas and veteran savvy, Coen hired newbies. Starting with the leader himself to coordinators to assistant coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with first-timers. That kind of approach is intriguing on paper, but frequently fails in practice – as past failures are a warning – because everyone is learning a their job in real-time. But Coen has managed to bring everyone and everything together.

Following an initial hot beginning, there was a chance that the season would go off the rails. A mid-year setback had the Jags wobbling again. That's usually when leaders overcorrect. Coen didn't. Rather, he simplified things. Jacksonville stopped chasing explosive answers and started hunting reliable ones. The coach recentered the offense around his playmakers and the ground attack, and encouraged his QB to use his mobility more.

The outcomes are evident. The Jaguars have won seven games consecutively and will be the AFC's No 3 playoff seed. Coen receives the tiniest knock in the rankings because he took over a skilled roster, but he has proven he can get the most out of that talent.

3) Mike Macdonald, His Team, 13-3

Each Strong of the Year narrative has a defining decision. For the Seahawks coach, it was his QB move.

Moving on from a incumbent, signing a different signal-caller and partnering him with an new play-caller could have derailed the season in the early weeks. Rather, it shaped it. Through the middle point of the season, the new QB was an MVP front-runner. He has regressed after that time, dropping to a lower rank in efficiency per pass attempt over the latter part of the season, putting him just one spot ahead of other QBs.

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