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Ordinarily, the NFL's Head Coach of the Year award follows a simple formula. It often functions as a type of mea culpa. We regret we got wrong your franchise in our pre-campaign projections.

On paper, it's a clear-cut path: the skipper who oversaw the largest resurgence is handed the award. In practice, it creates an yearly debate about preseason outlooks and whether we're actually rewarding superior coaching or simply the biggest shock.

However the latest field is distinctly different. The pool of nominees is remarkably deep. It has been the season of turnarounds. The league has been chaotic, with reigning division winners declining and recent underperformers ascending together. Under an ordinary year, a coach guiding the his team to the summit of the conference would make him the clear front-runner. But in this turbulent and fun year, he's competing with multiple other outstanding coaches.

This is how the projected ballot should shake out.

5) Ben Johnson, His Team, Their Record

Voters for Coach of the Year voters adore quarterbacks. This is a tradition. A certain coach in 2017. Another in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. If you fix a franchise QB, you're halfway home.

Ben Johnson hasn't just fixed Caleb Williams; he's freed him. Within an ideal ecosystem, the QB has been afforded the opportunity to showcase his rare talent. From midseason onward, the Bears rank number four in offensive EPA per play. That's not a lucky run – it's consistent performance. Under his guidance, the quarterback has become more decisive, far less reckless, and has willingly submitted to the scheme instead of freelancing. It is an offense designed entirely in Johnson's image: a physical run game, a heavy dose of play-action passes and a imaginative aerial game that springs wide-open targets all over the field. Williams has taken advantage. And when clear throws haven't been there, he's been able to spin big plays out of nothing.

Johnson arrived to the Bears with a clear offensive vision. Virtually every bet – overhauling the trenches, utilizing the tight ends, turning the QB into a timing-based passer – has paid off. This is uncommon for a first-year skipper. And it's rarer still for a coach who entered the organization with the immense pressure he did. For consecutive straight cycles, he was the top name on the coaching carousel. But when it comes to selecting a leader, there are zero sure things. Remarkably, he has met the hype – and even exceeded them. He's demonstrated not only to be a scheme dork but the kind of leader that can inject new life into an franchise.

In a normal season, Johnson would be the clear-cut favorite. But this is not a typical year!

Where Johnson's case runs a bit into trouble is on the defensive side. The Bears presently rank 25th in defensive efficiency. They are relying on takeaways, and takeaways are famously fickle. Coaches can focus on creating turnovers, but nobody can ensure it. Johnson is on the ballot because the offensive production is legitimate. He's ranked lower because luck is doing an outsized share of the defensive heavy lifting. If not for a few bounces of the ball, the Bears would be several wins behind. It's been an exceptional turnaround, and the core is in place for sustained winning. But Johnson comes up short here.

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

Coen is in a comparable position to his counterpart. He's a fellow rookie head coach who has orchestrated a dramatic resurgence. During the stretch run of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the finest overall ball of his career. And he's also spearheaded the remaking of a defense that now sits at fifth in the league in EPA per play.

Even more notably, he has excelled at the leadership aspects, which wasn't a given following his initial press conference introduction and some of his preseason moves.

The coach walked into Jacksonville with an exceptionally inexperienced coaching staff. Unlike other coaches, who packed their staff with the ideal coaching cocktail of new ideas and experience, he hired newbies. Starting with the head coach himself to coordinators to position coaches, the Jaguars are stocked with rookies. That type of setup is exciting on paper, but frequently fails in reality – as past failures are a warning – because everyone is learning a new job on the fly. But Coen has pulled the entire group and everything into sync.

Following an early hot beginning, there was a risk that the season would go off the rails. A mid-year setback had the team stumbling once more. That's typically when coaches panic and change too much. He did not. Instead, he simplified the approach. Jacksonville stopped pursuing home-run plays and started seeking reliable ones. The coach refocused the attack around his playmakers and the ground attack, and asked Lawrence to use his legs more.

The results are obvious. The Jaguars have won multiple games consecutively and will be the AFC's number three playoff seed. He gets the slightest knock in the rankings because he inherited a skilled team, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that roster.

3) Mike Macdonald, Seattle Seahawks, Their Record

Every Coach of the Year argument has a defining moment. For Mike Macdonald, it was his quarterback move.

Moving on from a incumbent, bringing in a new quarterback and partnering him with an new play-caller might have ended the season in October. Rather, it made it. Through the middle point of the year, the new QB was an Most Valuable Player contender. He has cooled off after that hot streak, dropping to 23rd in efficiency per pass attempt over the latter part of the schedule, putting him just one spot ahead of peers.

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