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Typically, the NFL's Coach of the Year award adheres to a straightforward pattern. It commonly acts as a type of mea culpa. Sorry we got wrong your team in our pre-campaign predictions.

On paper, it's a direct line: the skipper who oversaw the largest improvement wins the prize. However, it creates an annual discussion about expectations and whether we're genuinely honoring excellent coaching or simply the biggest shock.

Yet the current race is distinctly different. The group of nominees is unusually talented. It has been the season of turnarounds. The league has been unpredictable, with recent division winners declining and recent strugglers improving together. Under an typical year, a coach guiding the his team to the top of the AFC would make him the overwhelming favorite. But in such a wild and fun year, he's up against five other elite coaches.

This is how the projected vote ought to shake out.

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

Voters for Coach of the Year voters love quarterbacks. This is a tradition. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. If you solve a quarterback, you're halfway home.

Ben Johnson hasn't just fixed his young quarterback; he's unleashed him. Within an ideal system, the QB has been afforded the chance to display his special talent. Since Week 9, the Chicago offense rank fourth in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a lucky run – it's sustained excellence. Under Johnson, the quarterback has become increasingly confident, less careless, and has eagerly surrendered to the system rather than improvising. It is an offense constructed entirely in the coach's image: a bully-ball ground attack, a heavy helping of play-action and a innovative aerial game that frees wide-open targets everywhere. Williams has thrived. And when openings weren't available, he's been able to create big plays out of broken plays.

The coach arrived to the Bears with a clear offensive blueprint. Virtually each gamble – overhauling the offensive line, utilizing the tight ends, transforming Williams into a rhythm thrower – has worked. That's uncommon for a first-year head coach. And it's rarer still for a coach who walked into the building with the immense expectations he did. For two straight cycles, he was the top name on the coaching market. However when it comes to hiring a leader, there are no sure things. Remarkably, he has met the hype – and even exceeded them. He's demonstrated not just to be a offensive dork but the kind of culture builder that can inject new life into an organization.

In a typical year, he would be the runaway favorite. But this isn't a typical year!

The area where Johnson's candidacy comes a bit into trouble is on the defensive side. The Bears currently sit in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are surviving on turnovers, and takeaways are famously inconsistent. Coaches can emphasise ball disruption, but no one can ensure it. Johnson is on the ballot because the offensive production is real. He's not higher because luck is doing too much of the defense's heavy lifting. If not for a few breaks of the ball, the Bears would be several wins worse off. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the core is established for long-term success. However Johnson comes up short here.

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

The Jaguars' coach is in a similar situation to his counterpart. He's another rookie head coach who has engineered a dramatic turnaround. During the crucial final weeks of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the most complete all-around ball of his professional life. And he's also overseen the remaking of a defense that now ranks number five in the league in EPA per play.

What's more impressively, Coen has excelled at the intangibles stuff, which wasn't a guarantee following his initial press conference introduction and some of his offseason moves.

The coach took over the Jaguars with an exceptionally raw staff. In contrast to other coaches, who packed themselves with the ideal staff cocktail of new ideas and veteran savvy, he bet on newbies. From the leader on down to assistants to assistant coaches, the Jags are filled with first-timers. That kind of approach is intriguing in theory, but often collapses in reality – with other teams are a cautionary tale – because everybody is figuring out a new job on the fly. But he has pulled the entire group and everything together.

Following an initial strong beginning, there was a risk that the campaign would veer off the rails. A mid-year collapse had the Jags wobbling again. That's typically when coaches overcorrect. Coen didn't. Instead, he simplified the approach. Jacksonville stopped pursuing home-run plays and started hunting consistent ones. Coen refocused the offense around his playmakers and the ground attack, and encouraged his QB to use his legs more.

The results are clear. The Jags have won multiple games in a row and will be the AFC's No 3 playoff seed. Coen receives the tiniest deduction in the rankings because he took over a talented team, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that roster.

3) Mike Macdonald, His Team, 13-3

Every Coach of the Year case has a hinge decision. For the Seahawks coach, it was his QB decision.

Parting ways from a veteran, signing a different quarterback and partnering him with an innovative offensive coordinator might have ended the campaign in October. Rather, it defined it. Through the middle point of the season, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player candidate. He has regressed since that time, slipping to 23rd in efficiency per dropback over the latter part of the schedule, placing him only a single spot ahead of other QBs.

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