🔗 Share this article

Usually, the NFL's Head Coach of the Year trophy adheres to a simple pattern. It often functions as a type of mea culpa. Our apologies we underestimated your squad in our pre-campaign forecasts.

Theoretically, it's a direct trajectory: the skipper who orchestrated the most dramatic resurgence receives the award. In practice, it sparks an annual argument about preseason outlooks and whether we're truly rewarding superior coaching or simply the biggest shock.

However the latest field is fundamentally different. The list of contenders is unusually talented. It has been the season of resurgences. The NFL has been messy, with recent conference champions fading and recent strugglers improving collectively. During an ordinary year, a coach guiding the Denver Broncos to the summit of the AFC would make him the clear front-runner. Yet in such a chaotic and thrilling season, he's competing with several other elite candidates.

Here is how the ideal vote ought to look.

5) The Chicago Bears Coach, Chicago Bears, Their Record

Coach of the Year selectors are fascinated by signal-callers. They always have. Sean McVay in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. A third in 2022. When you transform a franchise QB, you're halfway to winning the award.

The Bears' head coach didn't merely corrected his young quarterback; he's unleashed him. Given a proper environment, the QB has been afforded the chance to display his otherworldly talent. From midseason onward, the Bears rank number four in offensive EPA per play. That's not a lucky run – it's prolonged performance. Under his guidance, the quarterback has become increasingly confident, less reckless, and has willingly surrendered to the gameplan rather than going rogue. It is an offense constructed entirely in Johnson's vision: a physical run game, a heavy dose of play-action passes and a imaginative passing attack that frees wide receiver receivers consistently. The QB has capitalized. And when openings haven't been there, he's been capable to conjure magic from nothing.

The coach arrived to the Bears with a clear offensive vision. Virtually every gamble – rebuilding the trenches, utilizing the tight ends, turning Williams into a timing-based passer – has succeeded. This is 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 cycles, he was the hottest candidate on the head coaching market. But when it comes to hiring a leader, there are no sure things. Somehow, Johnson has lived up to expectations – and even surpassed them. He's proven not just to be a scheme genius but the type of leader that can inject fresh energy into an organization.

During a typical season, Johnson would be the overwhelming favorite. But the current is not a normal season!

The area where his candidacy runs slightly into trouble is on defense. The Bears presently rank in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are relying on turnovers, and takeaways are famously fickle. Defensive minds can emphasise ball disruption, but no one can guarantee it. Johnson is on the ballot because the offensive production is sustainable. He's ranked lower because luck is doing an outsized share of the defensive heavy lifting. If not for a few bounces of the ball, the team would be two victories worse off. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the foundation is in place for sustained winning. However Johnson falls just short here.

4) The Jacksonville Jaguars Coach, His Team, 12-4

The Jaguars' coach is in a similar position to Johnson. He's a fellow rookie leader who has masterminded a dramatic turnaround. Over the stretch run of the year, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the best all-around ball of his professional life. And he's also spearheaded the transformation of a defense that now ranks number five in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.

What's more impressively, Coen has nailed the leadership stuff, which was not a given following his early press conference introduction and some of his offseason decisions.

The coach walked into the Jaguars with an uncommonly inexperienced staff. In contrast to Johnson, who surrounded their staff with the perfect staff mix of new ideas and experience, Coen hired first-timers. From the head coach himself to assistants to position coaches, the Jaguars are filled with rookies. That kind of approach is intriguing on paper, but frequently collapses in practice – with other teams are a warning – because everyone is learning a new job on the fly. Yet Coen has managed to bring everyone and all elements into sync.

Following an initial hot beginning, there was a risk that the season would veer off the rails. A mid-year collapse caused the Jags stumbling again. That's usually when leaders overcorrect. Coen did not. Rather, he simplified the approach. The offense stopped chasing explosive plays and started seeking reliable ones. The coach refocused the attack around his playmakers and the running game, and encouraged Lawrence to use his mobility more.

The outcomes are clear. The Jaguars have won multiple games consecutively and will be the AFC's No 3 playoff seed. Coen gets the slightest deduction in the standings because he took over a skilled roster, but he has proven he can get the most out of that talent.

3) Mike Macdonald, Seattle Seahawks, Their Record

Every Strong of the Year narrative has a defining decision. For the Seahawks coach, it was his quarterback decision.

Moving on from a incumbent, bringing in a new signal-caller and pairing him with an new offensive coordinator could have ended the season in the early weeks. Instead, it made it. By the middle point of the year, the new QB was an Most Valuable Player candidate. He has cooled off after that time, slipping to 23rd in efficiency per dropback over the latter part of the season, placing him just one place ahead of other QBs.

Still