The Way The Unusual Season Redefined the Conventional NFL Coach of the Year Blueprint.

Ordinarily, the NFL's Coach of the Year trophy follows a straightforward formula. It often functions as a type of apology. We regret we underestimated your squad in our preseason forecasts.

Theoretically, it's a clear-cut trajectory: the skipper who oversaw the largest turnaround wins the prize. In reality, it creates an yearly discussion about expectations and whether we're actually rewarding excellent leadership or just the most shocking upset.

Yet the current competition is distinctly different. The list of contenders is unusually talented. It has been the season of turnarounds. The NFL has been unpredictable, with recent conference champions declining and longtime also-rans improving collectively. In an typical year, a coach guiding the Denver Broncos to the summit of the conference would make him the clear front-runner. But in this turbulent and thrilling year, he's up against five other exceptional coaches.

Below is how the hypothetical vote should look.

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

Coach of the Year selectors love signal-callers. History shows this. Sean McVay in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. If you fix a franchise QB, you're well on your way home.

Ben Johnson not only fixed Caleb Williams; he's unleashed him. Given a proper environment, Williams has been afforded the chance to display his special ability. From midseason onward, the Chicago offense sit at number four in offensive EPA per play. That's not a brief surge – it's sustained excellence. Under his guidance, the quarterback has become more confident, far less careless, and has eagerly submitted to the system instead of going rogue. It is an offense designed entirely in the coach's image: a physical ground attack, a consistent dose of play-action passes and a innovative passing attack that frees wide receiver targets everywhere. Williams has taken advantage. And when easy reads weren't available, he's been able to create magic out of nothing.

The coach arrived to Chicago with a specific offensive philosophy. Virtually each gamble – rebuilding the offensive line, utilizing the tight ends, turning the QB into a rhythm passer – has paid off. This is rare for a rookie head coach. And it's even more uncommon still for a leader who walked into the building with the level of pressure Johnson did. For two straight offseasons, he was the most sought-after name on the coaching carousel. But when it comes to selecting a leader, there are zero sure things. Remarkably, Johnson has lived up to the hype – and even exceeded them. He's proven not only to be a offensive genius but the type of leader that can breathe new life into an franchise.

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

Where his candidacy comes a bit into trouble is on defense. The Bears currently rank 25th in defensive success rate. They are living on takeaways, and turnovers are famously unreliable. Coaches can stress creating turnovers, but no one can guarantee it. Johnson is on the ballot because the offense is real. He's ranked lower because variance is doing too much of the defensive heavy lifting. If not for a few bounces of the ball, the Bears would be several wins worse off. It's been an exceptional turnaround, and the foundation is in place for sustained winning. However he comes up just short here.

4) Liam Coen, His Team, Their Record

The Jaguars' coach is in a similar spot to Johnson. He's another first-time leader who has masterminded a swift turnaround. Over the stretch run of the season, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the most complete overall ball of his career. And he's also spearheaded the transformation of a defense that now ranks fifth in the league in Expected Points Added per play.

Even more impressively, Coen has excelled at the intangibles stuff, which wasn't a given after his early press conference introduction and some of his preseason decisions.

Coen walked into Jacksonville with an uncommonly inexperienced coaching staff. Unlike other coaches, who surrounded themselves with the ideal coaching mix of youth and experience, Coen hired newbies. Starting with the head coach on down to coordinators to position coaches, the Jags are filled with rookies. That kind of approach is intriguing in theory, but often fails in practice – as past failures are a warning – because everybody is learning a their job on the fly. Yet he has managed to bring the entire group and all elements into sync.

After an initial strong start, there was a chance that the campaign would go off the rails. A mid-year setback had the Jags stumbling once more. That's usually when leaders panic and change too much. He didn't. Instead, he streamlined the approach. The offense stopped pursuing home-run plays and started hunting reliable ones. Coen recentered the attack around key players and the ground attack, and asked Lawrence to use his mobility more often.

The outcomes are evident. The Jaguars have won multiple games consecutively and will be the conference's number three seed. He gets the tiniest knock in the rankings because he took over a skilled roster, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that talent.

3) The Seattle Seahawks Coach, His Team, 13-3

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

Parting ways from a incumbent, signing a different signal-caller and partnering him with an innovative play-caller could have derailed the season in the early weeks. Instead, it shaped it. Through the middle point of the season, the acquisition was an Most Valuable Player candidate. He has cooled off after that time, slipping to 23rd in EPA per dropback over the latter part of the season, putting him just a single place ahead of other QBs.

Still

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The Way The Unusual Season Redefined the Conventional NFL Coach of the Year Blueprint.

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

4) Liam Coen, His Team, Their Record

3) The Seattle Seahawks Coach, His Team, 13-3

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