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Ordinarily, the National Football League's Head Coach of the Year honor adheres to a straightforward formula. It commonly functions as a type of mea culpa. We regret we got wrong your team in our preseason projections.

On paper, it's a direct trajectory: the skipper who oversaw the biggest improvement receives the award. However, it creates an yearly discussion about expectations and whether we're genuinely honoring excellent coaching or merely the most shocking upset.

Yet the latest competition is distinctly unique. The pool of nominees is unusually strong. It has been the season of resurgences. The league has been unpredictable, with reigning division champions declining and recent strugglers rising collectively. During an ordinary season, Sean Payton guiding the his team to the top of the AFC would make him the clear front-runner. But in such a chaotic and fun season, he's up against several other exceptional candidates.

Below is how the projected ballot could shake out.

5) Ben Johnson, Chicago Bears, 11-5

Voters for Coach of the Year selectors love quarterbacks. This is a tradition. A certain coach in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. A third in 2022. If you fix a franchise QB, you're well on your way home.

Ben Johnson didn't merely fixed Caleb Williams; he's unlocked him. Given a proper environment, Williams has been given the opportunity to demonstrate his special talent. Since Week 9, the Bears rank fourth in offensive Expected Points Added per play. This isn't a lucky run – it's consistent performance. With his guidance, Williams has become more confident, far less careless, and has eagerly surrendered to the system rather than freelancing. It is an attack built entirely in Johnson's image: a physical ground attack, a heavy helping of play-action and a creative passing attack that frees wide receiver targets all over the field. The QB has capitalized. And when openings haven't been there, he's been able to create big plays out of nothing.

Johnson came to Chicago with a specific offensive blueprint. Almost every decision – overhauling the trenches, utilizing the pass-catchers, transforming Williams into a rhythm passer – has succeeded. That's rare for a first-year head coach. And it's even more uncommon still for a coach who entered the building with the level of expectations he did. For consecutive straight cycles, he was the top candidate on the coaching carousel. But when it comes to selecting a leader, there are no guarantees. Somehow, he has met expectations – and even surpassed them. He's demonstrated not just to be a offensive genius but the type of leader that can inject fresh energy into an franchise.

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

The area where his case comes slightly into trouble is on defense. The Chicago defense currently sit 25th in defensive success rate. They are surviving on takeaways, and takeaways are notoriously fickle. Defensive minds can stress creating turnovers, but nobody can guarantee it. Johnson is on the list because the offense is sustainable. He's not higher because variance is doing an outsized share of the defense's heavy lifting. With a couple breaks of the ball, the team would be two wins worse off. It's been an exceptional transformation, and the core is in place for long-term winning. However Johnson comes up short here.

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

Coen is in a similar spot to Johnson. He's a fellow first-time leader who has masterminded a swift resurgence. Over the crucial final weeks of the season, he has his franchise quarterback playing the finest overall ball of his professional life. And he's also spearheaded the overhaul of a defensive unit that now ranks fifth in the NFL in EPA per play.

What's more notably, Coen has excelled at the off-field stuff, which was not a certainty following his initial public appearances and some of his preseason decisions.

Coen walked into the Jaguars with an uncommonly raw staff. Unlike other coaches, who surrounded themselves with the ideal staff blend of new ideas and experience, he trusted newbies. Starting with the head coach on down to assistants to assistant coaches, the Jags are filled with first-timers. That kind of approach is exciting in theory, but frequently fails in practice – as past failures are a cautionary tale – because everyone is learning a new job on the fly. But he has managed to bring everyone and all elements into sync.

Following an initial hot start, there was a chance that the campaign would go off the rails. A mid-year collapse caused the Jags stumbling once more. That's usually when leaders panic and change too much. He didn't. Rather, he simplified things. The offense stopped chasing home-run answers and started seeking reliable ones. The coach recentered the offense around his playmakers and the running game, and encouraged Lawrence to use his mobility more often.

The results are clear. The Jags have won multiple games in a row and will be the AFC's number three seed. He gets the slightest knock in the rankings because he took over a talented roster, but he has proven he can maximize that roster.

3) The Seattle Seahawks Coach, Seattle Seahawks, Their Record

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

Moving on from a veteran, signing a different quarterback and partnering him with an new play-caller might have derailed the campaign in the early weeks. Instead, it defined it. By the mid point of the season, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player candidate. He has cooled off after that time, 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