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Ordinarily, the National Football League's Coach of the Year honor adheres to a simple formula. It often serves as a kind of mea culpa. We regret we got wrong your team in our pre-campaign forecasts.

On paper, it's a clear-cut trajectory: the coach who oversaw the biggest improvement receives the award. In reality, it sparks an yearly argument about expectations and whether we're truly honoring superior leadership or just the greatest upset.

However the latest competition is distinctly different. The pool of contenders is remarkably deep. It has been the campaign of resurgences. The league has been chaotic, with reigning conference winners falling away and recent strugglers ascending collectively. Under an normal year, Sean Payton leading the Denver Broncos to the summit of the conference would make him the clear front-runner. Yet in this wild and fun year, he's competing with five other outstanding coaches.

This is how the projected ballot should shake out.

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

Voters for Coach of the Year selectors love QBs. They always have. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. If you transform a quarterback, you're well on your way home.

Ben Johnson didn't merely fixed his young quarterback; he's unlocked him. In the right environment, the QB has been given the opportunity to demonstrate his special talent. From Week 9, the Bears rank fourth in offensive EPA per play. That's not a lucky run – it's prolonged excellence. Under his guidance, Williams has become more decisive, far less careless, and has eagerly surrendered to the system instead of improvising. It is an offense designed solely in the coach's vision: a bully-ball ground attack, a consistent helping of play-action and a imaginative aerial game that creates wide receiver receivers consistently. Williams has capitalized. And when clear throws weren't available, he's been able to create magic from broken plays.

The coach arrived to Chicago with a clear offensive philosophy. Virtually every gamble – overhauling the trenches, utilizing the pass-catchers, turning Williams into a rhythm passer – has worked. That's uncommon for a first-year head coach. And it's even more uncommon still for a leader who walked into the organization with the immense pressure he did. For consecutive straight offseasons, he was the most sought-after candidate on the head coaching market. But when it comes to hiring a leader, there are zero sure things. Somehow, Johnson has lived up to the hype – and even exceeded them. He's demonstrated not just to be a scheme dork but the kind of culture builder that can breathe new life into an organization.

During a normal year, Johnson would be the runaway favorite. Yet this isn't a typical season!

The area where Johnson's case comes a bit unstuck is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense presently sit in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are relying on turnovers, and takeaways are famously unreliable. Coaches can focus on creating turnovers, but nobody can ensure it. He is on the list because the offensive production is legitimate. He's not higher because luck is doing too much of the defense's heavy lifting. With a couple bounces of the ball, the team would be several victories worse off. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the foundation is established for long-term success. But Johnson comes up short here.

4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, 12-4

Coen is in a similar position to his counterpart. He's another rookie head coach who has masterminded a rapid turnaround. During the crucial final weeks of the season, he has his franchise quarterback playing the best all-around football of his professional life. And he's also overseen the overhaul of a defensive unit that now sits at fifth in the NFL in EPA per play.

Even more notably, Coen has mastered the off-field aspects, which was not a guarantee after his initial press conference appearances and some of his preseason moves.

The coach took over Jacksonville with an exceptionally inexperienced coaching staff. Unlike other coaches, who packed themselves with the ideal staff blend of new ideas and experience, Coen trusted newbies. From the leader on down to assistants to position coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with first-timers. That type of setup is exciting in theory, but often collapses in practice – with other teams are a warning – because everyone is learning a their job in real-time. But he has pulled everyone and everything into sync.

Following an initial hot start, there was a chance that the campaign would veer off the track. A midseason setback had the Jags stumbling again. That's usually when leaders overcorrect. He did not. Instead, he simplified the approach. Jacksonville stopped chasing explosive plays and started hunting sustainable ones. The coach recentered the offense around key players and the running game, and asked Lawrence to use his legs more often.

The outcomes are obvious. The Jaguars have won multiple games in a row and will be the conference's No 3 playoff seed. Coen gets the tiniest deduction in the standings because he took over a talented team, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that talent.

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

Each Strong of the Year case has a defining moment. For the Seahawks coach, it was his quarterback decision.

Moving on from a veteran, signing a different signal-caller and partnering him with an new offensive coordinator could have derailed the season in the early weeks. Instead, it made it. By the mid point of the season, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player candidate. He has fallen away since that hot streak, dropping to a lower rank in efficiency per pass attempt over the second half of the schedule, placing him just a single place ahead of other QBs.

Still