The Way This Strange Season Redefined the Traditional Coach of the Year Formula.

Typically, the National Football League's Head Coach of the Year trophy follows a simple formula. It frequently functions as a form of apology. Sorry we got wrong your squad in our preseason predictions.

Theoretically, it's a clear-cut path: the coach who orchestrated the largest turnaround wins the award. However, it creates an annual discussion about preseason outlooks and whether we're genuinely rewarding excellent coaching or merely the most shocking surprise.

But the current field is profoundly unique. The list of nominees is unusually strong. It has been the campaign of comebacks. The league has been messy, with reigning division champions fading and recent underperformers improving in unison. During an typical year, a coach guiding the his team to the top of the AFC would make him the overwhelming favorite. But in this turbulent and entertaining year, he's facing several other outstanding coaches.

Here is how the hypothetical ballot should be structured.

5) The Chicago Bears Coach, Chicago Bears, Their Record

Voters for Coach of the Year voters love QBs. They always have. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. If you transform a quarterback, you're halfway to winning the award.

The Bears' head coach not only fixed his young quarterback; he's unleashed him. Given a proper ecosystem, Williams has been given the chance to display his rare ability. Since Week 9, the Bears sit at number four in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a brief surge – it's sustained performance. With his guidance, Williams has become increasingly confident, far less careless, and has willingly surrendered to the system instead of freelancing. It is an offense built solely in Johnson's image: a bully-ball ground attack, a consistent helping of play-action passes and a innovative passing attack that frees wide receiver targets all over the field. Williams has thrived. And when easy reads weren't there, he's been capable to create magic from broken plays.

The coach came to Chicago with a clear offensive philosophy. Virtually every decision – overhauling the trenches, featuring the tight ends, turning the QB into a timing-based thrower – has worked. This is rare for a first-year skipper. And it's even more uncommon yet for a leader who walked into the organization with the level of pressure Johnson did. For consecutive straight offseasons, he was the most sought-after name on the head coaching market. But when it comes to hiring a head coach, there are zero sure things. Somehow, he has met the hype – and even surpassed them. He's proven not only to be a offensive dork but the kind of culture builder that can inject fresh energy into an organization.

During a typical season, he would be the clear-cut favorite. But the current is not a normal year!

The area where Johnson's case comes slightly into trouble is on defense. The Bears currently rank in the bottom third in defensive efficiency. They are surviving on turnovers, and turnovers are famously inconsistent. Coaches can focus on ball disruption, but nobody can guarantee it. He is on the list because the offense is sustainable. He's ranked lower because luck is doing an outsized share of the defensive work. If not for a few breaks of the ball, the team would be several wins worse off. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the core is established for sustained success. However he comes up just short in this ranking.

4) Liam Coen, His Team, Their Record

The Jaguars' coach is in a similar position to his counterpart. He's another rookie leader who has masterminded a swift resurgence. Over the crucial final weeks of the season, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the finest all-around ball of his professional life. And he's also overseen the transformation of a defensive unit that now sits at fifth in the NFL in EPA per play.

Even more notably, he has excelled at the intangibles aspects, which was not a given following his early public introduction and some of his offseason decisions.

Coen walked into the Jaguars with an uncommonly inexperienced coaching staff. Unlike other coaches, who packed their staff with the ideal staff cocktail of youth and experience, he bet on newbies. From the leader on down to coordinators to assistant coaches, the Jaguars are filled with rookies. That kind of approach is intriguing in theory, but frequently collapses in practice – as past failures are a warning – because everybody is figuring out a their job on the fly. But he has managed to bring the entire group and all elements together.

Following an initial strong beginning, there was a chance that the season would go off the track. A mid-year collapse had the team stumbling again. That's typically when coaches panic and change too much. Coen didn't. Instead, he streamlined the approach. The offense stopped pursuing explosive plays and started hunting consistent ones. The coach refocused the offense around key players and the ground attack, and encouraged his QB to use his legs more.

The outcomes are obvious. The Jaguars have won seven games consecutively and will be the AFC's number three playoff seed. Coen receives the slightest knock in the rankings because he took over a skilled team, but he has demonstrated he can get the most out of that roster.

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

Every Coach of the Year narrative has a defining decision. For Mike Macdonald, it was his QB move.

Parting ways from a incumbent, bringing in a different quarterback and pairing him with an new play-caller might have derailed the season in the early weeks. Rather, it made it. Through the mid point of the year, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player contender. He has regressed after that time, slipping to a lower rank in efficiency per dropback over the latter part of the season, putting him just a single spot ahead of peers.

Still