🔗 Share this article

Ordinarily, the NFL's Coach of the Year trophy adheres to a straightforward formula. It commonly acts as a kind of mea culpa. We regret we underestimated your team in our pre-campaign projections.

On paper, it's a clear-cut path: the skipper who orchestrated the largest improvement is handed the prize. In reality, it creates an yearly discussion about preseason outlooks and whether we're truly honoring superior leadership or simply the biggest surprise.

But the latest race is distinctly unique. The group of nominees is exceptionally strong. It has been the campaign of turnarounds. The NFL has been chaotic, with recent division winners declining and recent strugglers rising collectively. In an normal season, Sean Payton guiding the his team to the summit of the AFC would make him the overwhelming front-runner. But in such a turbulent and fun year, he's up against multiple other elite coaches.

Here is how the hypothetical vote should shake out.

5) Ben Johnson, His Team, Their Record

Voters for Coach of the Year selectors adore quarterbacks. This is a tradition. A certain coach in 2017. Another in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. Should you fix a quarterback, you're halfway to winning the award.

Ben Johnson not only fixed Caleb Williams; he's unleashed him. In the right ecosystem, the QB has been given the chance to showcase his special ability. Since Week 9, the Chicago offense sit at fourth in offensive Expected Points Added per play. That's not a lucky run – it's prolonged performance. Under Johnson, Williams has become increasingly decisive, far less reckless, and has willingly submitted to the system rather than going rogue. It is an attack built entirely in Johnson's image: a bully-ball ground attack, a steady helping of play-action passes and a imaginative aerial game that springs wide-open targets all over the field. Williams has taken advantage. And when clear throws haven't been there, he's been able to spin magic from broken plays.

Johnson came to Chicago with a specific offensive vision. Virtually each decision – rebuilding the offensive line, featuring the tight ends, transforming the QB into a timing-based passer – has paid off. That's rare for a first-year head coach. And it's rarer yet for a coach who walked into the organization 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, Johnson has lived up to expectations – and even exceeded them. He's demonstrated not just to be a scheme genius but the type of leader that can breathe new life into an franchise.

During a normal year, Johnson would be the runaway favorite. But this is not a typical campaign!

Where Johnson's candidacy runs slightly into trouble is on the defensive side. The Bears presently rank in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are relying on turnovers, and turnovers are famously inconsistent. Defensive minds can stress ball disruption, but no one can guarantee it. He is on the list because the offense is real. He's ranked lower because luck is doing too much of the defensive heavy lifting. If not for a few breaks of the ball, the team would be several wins worse off. It's been an exceptional transformation, and the core is in place for long-term winning. But he falls short in this ranking.

4) Liam Coen, His Team, Their Record

Coen is in a similar situation to Johnson. He's a fellow first-time head coach who has engineered a rapid turnaround. Over the crucial final weeks of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the finest all-around football of his professional life. And he's also spearheaded the transformation of a defense that now ranks fifth in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.

What's more notably, Coen has excelled at the leadership stuff, which wasn't a guarantee after his early public appearances and some of his preseason moves.

The coach took over Jacksonville with an uncommonly raw staff. In contrast to other coaches, who packed their staff with the ideal staff mix of youth and veteran savvy, Coen trusted newbies. Starting with the head coach on down to coordinators to position coaches, the Jaguars are filled with first-timers. That type of approach is intriguing in theory, but often collapses in practice – as past failures are a warning – because everyone is learning a new job in real-time. Yet Coen has managed to bring everyone and everything together.

Following an early hot beginning, there was a possibility that the season would veer off the track. A midseason collapse caused the team stumbling again. That's usually when leaders panic and change too much. Coen didn't. Instead, he simplified things. The offense stopped chasing home-run plays and started hunting reliable ones. Coen refocused the offense around his playmakers and the running game, and encouraged his QB to use his legs more often.

The outcomes are obvious. The Jags have won seven games in a row and will be the AFC's No 3 playoff seed. Coen gets the slightest knock in the standings because he inherited a talented team, but he has proven he can maximize that talent.

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

Every Strong of the Year narrative has a defining moment. For Mike Macdonald, it was his quarterback decision.

Parting ways from a incumbent, signing a different quarterback and partnering him with an innovative offensive coordinator might have derailed the campaign in October. Rather, it shaped it. By the middle point of the season, the new QB was an MVP contender. He has cooled off since 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 other QBs.

Still