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Usually, the National Football League's Head Coach of the Year award follows a simple formula. It commonly functions as a kind of apology. Our apologies we got wrong your team in our pre-campaign forecasts.

On paper, it's a direct path: the coach who engineered the biggest improvement wins the award. However, it sparks an annual debate about expectations and whether we're actually rewarding excellent coaching or simply the biggest shock.

However this year's field is distinctly different. The group of contenders is exceptionally talented. It has been the campaign of turnarounds. The NFL has been unpredictable, with reigning division winners declining and longtime underperformers improving collectively. In an ordinary year, a coach leading the his team to the top of the AFC would make him the stone-cold favorite. But in such a turbulent and fun season, he's competing with five other exceptional coaches.

Here is how the projected ballot could look.

5) Ben Johnson, Chicago Bears, Their Record

Voters for Coach of the Year voters love QBs. History shows this. A certain coach in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. If you fix a quarterback, you're halfway to winning the award.

Ben Johnson didn't merely fixed his young quarterback; he's unlocked him. Within an ideal environment, Williams has been afforded the chance to display his rare ability. Since midseason onward, the Bears rank fourth in offensive EPA per play. That's not a lucky run – it's sustained performance. With his guidance, the quarterback has become increasingly decisive, far less careless, and has eagerly submitted to the system rather than going rogue. It is an attack designed solely in Johnson's image: a bully-ball ground attack, a steady helping of play-action passes and a innovative aerial game that creates wide-open targets everywhere. Williams has taken advantage. And when clear throws haven't been available, he's been able to conjure magic from broken plays.

The coach came to Chicago with a defined offensive philosophy. Almost every gamble – overhauling the trenches, utilizing the tight ends, turning Williams into a timing-based passer – has worked. This is rare for a rookie skipper. And it's rarer yet for a coach who walked into the building with the kind of hype he did. For consecutive straight cycles, he was the hottest name on the coaching market. However when it comes to hiring a leader, there are zero guarantees. Somehow, Johnson has met expectations – and even exceeded them. He's proven not only to be a offensive dork but the kind of leader that can inject new life into an organization.

During a ordinary year, Johnson would be the overwhelming choice. But this isn't a normal season!

The area where his candidacy comes slightly into trouble is on the defensive side. The Bears currently sit in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are living on turnovers, and takeaways are notoriously unreliable. Coaches can emphasise creating turnovers, but nobody can guarantee it. He is on the ballot because the offensive production is real. He's not higher because luck is doing too much of the defense's work. If not for a couple breaks of the ball, the team would be several victories worse off. It's been an exceptional transformation, and the core is in place for sustained winning. However he falls short here.

4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, Their Record

The Jaguars' coach is in a comparable position to Johnson. He's a fellow rookie head coach who has masterminded a dramatic resurgence. During the stretch run of the season, he has his franchise quarterback playing the finest all-around football of his professional life. And he's also spearheaded the remaking of a defensive unit that now ranks fifth in the NFL in EPA per play.

What's more notably, he has nailed the leadership aspects, which wasn't a given following his initial public appearances and some of his offseason decisions.

The coach walked into Jacksonville with an exceptionally raw staff. Unlike Johnson, who surrounded themselves with the ideal coaching mix of youth and experience, Coen trusted first-timers. Starting with the head coach on down to assistants to assistant coaches, the Jaguars are filled with rookies. That type of approach is exciting in theory, but frequently collapses in reality – as past failures are a cautionary tale – because everybody is learning a their job on the fly. But Coen has managed to bring the entire group and everything together.

Following an early strong beginning, there was a chance that the season would veer off the track. A mid-year setback caused the Jags stumbling again. That's usually when leaders overcorrect. He didn't. Rather, he streamlined the approach. The offense stopped pursuing explosive plays and started hunting sustainable ones. The coach recentered the offense around his playmakers and the ground attack, and encouraged his QB to use his legs more.

The outcomes are clear. The Jags have won seven games in a row and will be the conference's No 3 playoff seed. He receives the slightest deduction in the standings because he took over a talented roster, but he has proven he can maximize that roster.

3) Mike Macdonald, Seattle Seahawks, 13-3

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

Moving on from a veteran, bringing in a new quarterback and pairing him with an new offensive coordinator might have derailed the campaign in October. Instead, it shaped it. By the mid point of the year, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player front-runner. He has regressed since that time, slipping to a lower rank in EPA per pass attempt over the latter part of the season, placing him just a single place ahead of other QBs.

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