🔗 Share this article

Typically, the NFL's Coach of the Year award follows a simple pattern. It frequently functions as a type of mea culpa. Our apologies we misjudged your franchise in our preseason projections.

On paper, it's a direct trajectory: the skipper who engineered the biggest turnaround wins the award. In practice, it sparks an annual argument about preseason outlooks and whether we're actually honoring superior coaching or just the biggest surprise.

However the current competition is distinctly unique. The group of candidates is remarkably strong. It has been the year of turnarounds. The league has been messy, with reigning conference winners fading and recent also-rans improving in unison. In an normal year, Sean Payton leading the Denver Broncos to the top of the conference would make him the stone-cold front-runner. Yet in this turbulent and thrilling year, he's facing several other elite candidates.

Here is how the hypothetical ballot ought to look.

5) Ben Johnson, His Team, 11-5

Coach of the Year selectors adore QBs. This is a tradition. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. If you fix a franchise QB, you're halfway home.

The Bears' head coach didn't merely fixed Caleb Williams; he's freed him. In the right system, the QB has been afforded the opportunity to demonstrate his special talent. Since midseason onward, the Chicago offense rank number four in offensive Expected Points Added per play. This isn't a hot streak – it's consistent excellence. With his guidance, the quarterback has become increasingly confident, less reckless, and has willingly submitted to the system rather than improvising. It is an offense constructed solely in Johnson's image: a bully-ball ground attack, a steady dose of play-action and a creative passing attack that frees wide receiver receivers all over the field. Williams has capitalized. And when clear throws haven't been available, he's been able to create big plays from broken plays.

Johnson arrived to Chicago with a defined offensive vision. Virtually each gamble – overhauling the offensive line, highlighting the pass-catchers, transforming the QB into a timing-based thrower – has succeeded. This is rare for a first-year skipper. And it's rarer yet for a leader who walked into the organization with the level of expectations Johnson did. For consecutive straight cycles, he was the hottest candidate on the head coaching carousel. However when it comes to hiring a leader, there are zero guarantees. Somehow, he has met expectations – and even exceeded them. He's proven not only to be a scheme dork but the kind of culture builder that can breathe fresh energy into an organization.

In a typical season, Johnson would be the runaway choice. Yet this is not a typical year!

The area where his candidacy comes slightly into trouble is on defense. The Bears presently sit in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are surviving on takeaways, and turnovers are notoriously inconsistent. Defensive minds can stress creating turnovers, but no one can ensure it. He is on the list because the offense is sustainable. He's not higher because variance is doing an outsized share of the defense's work. With a couple breaks of the ball, the Bears would be two victories worse off. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the core is in place for long-term winning. However Johnson falls just short in this ranking.

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

Coen is in a similar spot to Johnson. He's a fellow rookie leader who has orchestrated a dramatic turnaround. Over the stretch run of the season, he has his franchise quarterback playing the best overall ball of his professional life. And he's also spearheaded the transformation of a defense that now ranks fifth in the NFL in EPA per play.

Even more notably, Coen has mastered the off-field stuff, which wasn't a guarantee after his initial public appearances and some of his preseason moves.

The coach walked into the Jaguars with an uncommonly raw staff. In contrast to other coaches, who surrounded their staff with the perfect staff mix of new ideas and experience, he hired first-timers. From the head coach on down to assistants to assistant coaches, the Jags are stocked with first-timers. That kind of approach is intriguing in theory, but often fails in practice – as past failures are a cautionary tale – because everyone is figuring out a their job on the fly. But he has pulled everyone and everything into sync.

Following an initial hot beginning, there was a risk that the season would go off the track. A midseason collapse caused the team wobbling again. That's typically when leaders panic and change too much. He didn't. Instead, he streamlined things. Jacksonville stopped chasing home-run answers and started hunting consistent ones. The coach refocused the attack around key players and the ground attack, and asked Lawrence to use his legs more.

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

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

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

Moving on from a veteran, signing a new quarterback and partnering him with an new play-caller could have derailed the campaign in October. Rather, it defined it. Through the middle point of the year, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player candidate. He has cooled off after that hot streak, dropping to 23rd in EPA per dropback over the second half of the schedule, placing him just one spot ahead of peers.

Still