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Ordinarily, the NFL's Head Coach of the Year trophy follows a simple pattern. It commonly acts as a form of mea culpa. Our apologies we underestimated your franchise in our pre-campaign forecasts.

In theory, it's a clear-cut trajectory: the coach who orchestrated the most dramatic resurgence receives the prize. In practice, it fuels an yearly argument about preseason outlooks and whether we're genuinely rewarding superior leadership or simply the biggest surprise.

Yet the current race is fundamentally unique. The pool of contenders is unusually talented. It has been the year of resurgences. The league has been unpredictable, with recent division champions fading and longtime also-rans ascending in unison. During an normal year, a coach guiding the Denver Broncos to the top of the conference would make him the stone-cold front-runner. Yet in such a turbulent and entertaining season, he's facing multiple other elite candidates.

Below is how the projected ballot should shake out.

5) The Chicago Bears Coach, His Team, 11-5

Voters for Coach of the Year selectors adore QBs. This is a tradition. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. Should you transform a franchise QB, you're halfway to winning the award.

Ben Johnson not only fixed Caleb Williams; he's freed him. Within an ideal system, Williams has been given the opportunity to display his otherworldly ability. From midseason onward, the Bears sit at fourth in offensive EPA per play. That's not a brief surge – it's sustained excellence. With Johnson, Williams has become more decisive, far less careless, and has eagerly surrendered to the gameplan instead of going rogue. It is an attack designed entirely in the coach's image: a physical run game, a heavy helping of play-action passes and a innovative passing attack that springs wide receiver receivers all over the field. The QB has thrived. And when easy reads haven't been available, he's been able to create big plays from nothing.

The coach came to Chicago with a clear offensive philosophy. Almost every bet – rebuilding the offensive line, highlighting the pass-catchers, turning Williams into a rhythm thrower – has paid off. That's rare for a first-year head coach. And it's rarer yet for a coach who entered the building with the level of expectations Johnson did. For consecutive straight offseasons, he was the top candidate on the coaching carousel. But when it comes to hiring a leader, there are zero guarantees. Remarkably, Johnson has lived up to the hype – and even surpassed them. He's proven not just to be a scheme genius but the type of culture builder that can breathe fresh energy into an franchise.

In a ordinary year, he would be the clear-cut choice. But the current is not a normal season!

Where Johnson's candidacy comes slightly into trouble is on defense. The Bears presently rank in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are living on turnovers, and takeaways are famously fickle. Defensive minds can emphasise ball disruption, but no one can ensure it. He is on the list because the offensive production is real. He's ranked lower because luck is doing an outsized share of the defense's heavy lifting. If not for a couple bounces of the ball, the Bears would be several wins worse off. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the core is in place for long-term winning. However he falls just short in this ranking.

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

The Jaguars' coach is in a comparable position to Johnson. He's another rookie head coach who has orchestrated a dramatic turnaround. Over the stretch run of the season, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the best overall ball of his career. And he's also spearheaded the transformation of a defensive unit that now sits at number five in the league in Expected Points Added per play.

What's more impressively, Coen has excelled at the leadership stuff, which was not a given following his early press conference appearances and some of his preseason decisions.

The coach took over the Jaguars with an exceptionally inexperienced staff. Unlike Johnson, who packed themselves with the ideal staff blend of youth and experience, he trusted first-timers. Starting with the head coach himself to assistants to position coaches, the Jags are stocked with rookies. That type of setup is intriguing on paper, but frequently collapses in reality – with other teams are a cautionary tale – because everybody is learning a new job on the fly. But Coen has pulled everyone and everything into sync.

After an initial hot start, there was a risk that the campaign would veer off the rails. A mid-year collapse caused the Jags wobbling again. That's typically when coaches overcorrect. Coen didn't. Instead, he simplified things. Jacksonville stopped pursuing home-run answers and started hunting reliable ones. The coach recentered the attack around his playmakers and the running game, and asked his QB to use his mobility more.

The outcomes are evident. The Jags have won multiple games in a row and will be the AFC's No 3 seed. He receives the slightest deduction in the standings because he took over a talented team, but he has demonstrated he can get the most out of that talent.

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

Every Coach of the Year case has a hinge moment. For Mike Macdonald, it was his QB decision.

Parting ways from a veteran, signing a different quarterback and pairing him with an innovative offensive coordinator could have derailed the campaign in October. Instead, it made it. Through the mid point of the season, the new QB was an MVP candidate. He has fallen away after that hot streak, dropping to a lower rank in EPA per dropback over the latter part of the schedule, putting him only one place ahead of peers.

Still