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Ordinarily, the National Football League's Head Coach of the Year trophy adheres to a simple pattern. It commonly functions as a kind of mea culpa. Our apologies we misjudged your team in our pre-campaign predictions.

On paper, it's a direct path: the coach who orchestrated the largest turnaround receives the award. However, it sparks an yearly discussion about preseason outlooks and whether we're truly rewarding excellent coaching or merely the greatest upset.

However this year's race is profoundly unique. The pool of nominees is unusually deep. It has been the year of turnarounds. The league has been chaotic, with reigning division winners fading and longtime strugglers ascending collectively. During an normal year, a coach leading the his team to the summit of the conference would make him the overwhelming favorite. But in this wild and thrilling season, he's facing multiple other exceptional candidates.

This is how the hypothetical ballot ought to be structured.

5) Ben Johnson, Chicago Bears, Their Record

Voters for Coach of the Year selectors love quarterbacks. This is a tradition. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. If you transform a quarterback, you're well on your way home.

Ben Johnson not only fixed Caleb Williams; he's unlocked him. In the right ecosystem, the QB has been given the opportunity to showcase his special ability. From Week 9, the Chicago offense rank number four in offensive Expected Points Added per play. This isn't a hot streak – it's sustained excellence. With his guidance, Williams has become increasingly confident, far less careless, and has willingly surrendered to the gameplan rather than freelancing. It is an offense built entirely in Johnson's image: a bully-ball run game, a heavy dose of play-action and a imaginative passing attack that creates wide receiver receivers all over the field. The QB has capitalized. And when clear throws weren't available, he's been able to spin magic out of broken plays.

Johnson arrived to Chicago with a defined offensive blueprint. Virtually each gamble – overhauling the offensive line, highlighting the pass-catchers, transforming the QB into a rhythm passer – has worked. This is uncommon for a rookie head coach. And it's rarer still for a coach who walked into the organization with the immense pressure he did. For two straight offseasons, he was the hottest name on the head coaching carousel. But when it comes to hiring a head coach, there are zero sure things. Somehow, he has lived up to expectations – and even surpassed them. He's demonstrated not only to be a scheme wizard but the kind of leader that can inject new life into an organization.

During a ordinary year, he would be the clear-cut choice. Yet the current is not a normal season!

The area where Johnson's case comes a bit unstuck is on the defensive side. The Bears presently rank in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are living on turnovers, and turnovers are famously inconsistent. Defensive minds can focus on creating turnovers, but no one can guarantee it. Johnson is on the list because the offense is real. He's ranked lower because variance is doing too much of the defense's heavy lifting. If not for a few bounces of the ball, the team would be several wins behind. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the core is in place for sustained winning. But Johnson comes up short here.

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

Coen is in a comparable situation to Johnson. He's another rookie head coach who has masterminded a swift turnaround. Over the stretch run of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the best all-around football of his career. And he's also spearheaded the transformation of a defense that now sits at number five in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.

What's more impressively, Coen has nailed the intangibles aspects, which was not a certainty following his initial press conference appearances and some of his preseason moves.

The coach took over Jacksonville with an uncommonly inexperienced coaching staff. In contrast to Johnson, who surrounded their staff with the ideal coaching cocktail of new ideas and experience, he hired newbies. From the leader on down to coordinators to assistant coaches, the Jags are filled with rookies. That kind of setup is intriguing in theory, but frequently collapses in reality – as past failures are a warning – because everybody is learning a their job in real-time. Yet he has managed to bring everyone and all elements into sync.

After an initial strong beginning, there was a chance that the season would veer off the rails. A mid-year setback had the team stumbling once more. That's usually when leaders overcorrect. Coen did not. Rather, he simplified the approach. The offense stopped pursuing explosive plays and started seeking sustainable ones. Coen recentered the attack around key players and the ground attack, and encouraged Lawrence to use his legs more.

The results are evident. The Jaguars have won seven games in a row and will be the AFC's No 3 seed. Coen receives the tiniest knock in the standings because he inherited a talented team, but he has demonstrated he can get the most out of that roster.

3) Mike Macdonald, Seattle Seahawks, Their Record

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

Moving on from a veteran, signing a new signal-caller and pairing him with an new play-caller might have derailed the season in October. Instead, it shaped it. By the mid point of the season, the acquisition was an MVP front-runner. He has regressed after that hot streak, slipping to 23rd in efficiency per pass attempt over the latter part of the season, placing him just one spot ahead of other QBs.

Still