🔗 Share this article

Ordinarily, the NFL's Coach of the Year trophy adheres to a simple formula. It commonly serves as a type of apology. Our apologies we got wrong your franchise in our preseason projections.

Theoretically, it's a clear-cut path: the coach who oversaw the biggest turnaround is handed the award. In practice, it fuels an annual argument about expectations and whether we're truly honoring excellent leadership or merely the biggest upset.

Yet the latest competition is fundamentally different. The group of nominees is remarkably deep. It has been the year of comebacks. The NFL has been messy, with recent conference winners fading and recent also-rans rising in unison. Under an ordinary year, a coach guiding the Denver Broncos to the summit of the AFC would make him the stone-cold favorite. But in this wild and thrilling season, he's facing several other outstanding candidates.

This is how the projected ballot could shake out.

5) Ben Johnson, Chicago Bears, 11-5

Coach of the Year selectors are fascinated by signal-callers. History shows this. A certain coach in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. If you transform a quarterback, you're halfway home.

The Bears' head coach not only fixed Caleb Williams; he's freed him. Given a proper system, the QB has been afforded the chance to display his otherworldly ability. Since Week 9, the Chicago offense rank number four in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a lucky run – it's sustained performance. Under Johnson, the quarterback has become increasingly confident, less careless, and has willingly surrendered to the system rather than improvising. It is an offense constructed entirely in the coach's vision: a bully-ball run game, a heavy helping of play-action passes and a imaginative passing attack that springs wide receiver receivers everywhere. Williams has thrived. And when openings weren't available, he's been able to create magic out of broken plays.

Johnson came to Chicago with a clear offensive philosophy. Virtually every bet – overhauling the offensive line, featuring the pass-catchers, turning Williams into a timing-based thrower – has succeeded. This is uncommon for a first-year head coach. And it's rarer yet for a leader who walked into the organization with the immense hype Johnson did. For two straight cycles, he was the most sought-after name on the head coaching market. However when it comes to hiring a head coach, there are zero sure things. Somehow, Johnson has lived up to the hype – and even surpassed them. He's proven not just to be a offensive genius but the type of culture builder that can inject fresh energy into an franchise.

In a normal season, he would be the overwhelming choice. Yet the current is not a typical year!

The area where Johnson's candidacy comes a bit unstuck is on the defensive side. The Bears presently sit 25th in defensive efficiency. They are living on turnovers, and takeaways are famously fickle. Coaches can emphasise creating turnovers, but nobody can ensure it. He is on the ballot because the offense is legitimate. He's not higher because variance is doing too much of the defensive heavy lifting. If not for a couple breaks of the ball, the Bears would be two wins worse off. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the foundation is established for long-term winning. But he falls just short in this ranking.

4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, 12-4

The Jaguars' coach is in a similar position to his counterpart. He's a fellow rookie head coach who has masterminded a rapid resurgence. Over the crucial final weeks of the year, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the best all-around ball of his career. And he's also overseen the transformation of a defense that now sits at number five in the league in Expected Points Added per play.

Even more impressively, he has nailed the leadership aspects, which wasn't a certainty after his early public appearances and some of his offseason decisions.

The coach walked into Jacksonville with an uncommonly raw coaching staff. In contrast to Johnson, who surrounded themselves with the ideal staff cocktail of youth and experience, he hired newbies. From the leader himself to coordinators to assistant coaches, the Jags are stocked with first-timers. That kind of setup is exciting in theory, but often fails in practice – with other teams are a warning – because everybody is figuring out a their job on the fly. But he has pulled the entire group and everything together.

After an initial strong beginning, there was a possibility that the season would veer off the track. A mid-year setback caused the Jags wobbling once more. That's usually when leaders overcorrect. Coen did not. Instead, he streamlined things. The offense stopped chasing home-run plays and started seeking consistent ones. The coach recentered the offense around his playmakers and the running game, and asked Lawrence to use his legs more often.

The results are evident. The Jags have won multiple games in a row and will be the AFC's number three playoff seed. He receives the slightest deduction in the rankings 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 narrative has a defining moment. For the Seahawks coach, it was his quarterback choice.

Parting ways from a veteran, bringing in a different quarterback and partnering him with an innovative offensive coordinator might have ended the campaign in the early weeks. Instead, it made it. Through the mid point of the season, the new QB was an Most Valuable Player front-runner. He has cooled off since that time, dropping to a lower rank in EPA per pass attempt over the latter part of the schedule, placing him only a single spot ahead of peers.

Still