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Ordinarily, the NFL's Head Coach of the Year award adheres to a simple formula. It commonly acts as a type of mea culpa. We regret we misjudged your squad in our pre-campaign predictions.

In theory, it's a clear-cut trajectory: the skipper who oversaw the biggest improvement is handed the award. In reality, it fuels an annual argument about preseason outlooks and whether we're truly honoring excellent coaching or simply the most shocking shock.

But this year's race is fundamentally unique. The list of candidates is exceptionally talented. It has been the year of comebacks. The NFL has been chaotic, with reigning division champions falling away and recent also-rans ascending together. Under an ordinary year, Sean Payton leading the Denver Broncos to the summit of the AFC would make him the clear front-runner. Yet in such a chaotic and entertaining year, he's up against multiple other outstanding candidates.

Below is how the ideal ballot should look.

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

Coach of the Year selectors love QBs. This is a tradition. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. If you solve a franchise QB, you're well on your way to winning the award.

Ben Johnson not only fixed his young quarterback; he's unleashed him. Given a proper environment, Williams has been given the opportunity to demonstrate his otherworldly ability. Since midseason onward, the Chicago offense sit at fourth in offensive EPA per play. That's not a hot streak – it's prolonged performance. With Johnson, the quarterback has become increasingly decisive, less careless, and has willingly surrendered to the gameplan instead of improvising. It is an offense constructed solely in Johnson's vision: a physical run game, a steady helping of play-action and a innovative aerial game that springs wide receiver receivers all over the field. Williams has thrived. And when clear throws haven't been available, he's been able to conjure magic from broken plays.

The coach arrived to the Bears with a defined offensive philosophy. Almost every decision – rebuilding the offensive line, featuring the tight ends, transforming Williams into a timing-based thrower – has paid off. This is uncommon for a first-year skipper. And it's even more uncommon still for a coach who entered the building with the immense pressure he did. For consecutive straight offseasons, he was the top candidate on the head coaching market. However when it comes to selecting a head coach, there are no guarantees. Remarkably, Johnson has met the hype – and even surpassed them. He's demonstrated not just to be a offensive dork but the type of leader that can inject fresh energy into an organization.

During a normal season, he would be the runaway choice. But the current is not a typical season!

The area where his candidacy runs slightly into trouble is on defense. The Chicago defense presently rank in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are living on turnovers, and takeaways are notoriously fickle. Defensive minds can focus on creating turnovers, but nobody can guarantee it. He is on the list because the offense is legitimate. He's ranked lower because variance is doing an outsized share of the defensive heavy lifting. If not for a few breaks of the ball, the team would be two victories behind. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the core is in place for long-term success. However Johnson comes up short in this ranking.

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

Coen is in a comparable spot to Johnson. He's another first-time head coach who has orchestrated a swift turnaround. During the stretch run of the season, he has his franchise quarterback playing the best overall football of his career. And he's also overseen the remaking of a defense that now ranks number five in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.

What's more impressively, Coen has excelled at the off-field stuff, which was not a guarantee after his initial press conference introduction and some of his offseason decisions.

Coen walked into the Jaguars with an exceptionally raw staff. Unlike Johnson, who surrounded themselves with the perfect staff cocktail of youth and experience, he bet on newbies. Starting with the leader himself to assistants to assistant coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with rookies. That type of setup is exciting in theory, but frequently fails in practice – with other teams are a cautionary tale – because everybody is learning a new job on the fly. Yet Coen has pulled everyone and everything together.

After an early strong beginning, there was a possibility that the season would veer off the track. A mid-year collapse caused the Jags stumbling again. That's typically when coaches panic and change too much. He didn't. Instead, he streamlined things. Jacksonville stopped chasing explosive answers and started seeking consistent ones. The coach refocused the offense 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 gets the tiniest deduction in the standings because he took over a skilled team, but he has proven he can maximize that talent.

3) Mike Macdonald, His Team, 13-3

Every Strong of the Year narrative has a hinge moment. For Mike Macdonald, it was his quarterback move.

Moving on from a veteran, bringing in a different signal-caller and pairing him with an new play-caller might have derailed the campaign in the early weeks. Rather, it defined it. Through the mid point of the year, the new QB was an MVP candidate. He has cooled off after that hot streak, slipping to 23rd in efficiency per dropback over the second half of the schedule, placing him only a single spot ahead of peers.

Still