How The Unusual Season Broke the Typical NFL Coach of the Year Mold.
Usually, the NFL's Coach of the Year honor adheres to a straightforward script. It frequently acts as a type of apology. We regret we got wrong your team in our preseason predictions.
In theory, it's a clear-cut path: the coach who engineered the most dramatic improvement receives the prize. In reality, it fuels an yearly argument about expectations and whether we're genuinely rewarding excellent leadership or simply the most shocking shock.
Yet this year's field is distinctly different. The list of candidates is remarkably deep. It has been the year of resurgences. The league has been chaotic, with reigning division winners fading and recent underperformers ascending collectively. Under an normal year, a coach leading the Denver Broncos to the summit of the AFC would make him the clear front-runner. But in such a turbulent and entertaining season, he's up against several other elite coaches.
Below is how the projected ballot ought to look.
5) The Chicago Bears Coach, Chicago Bears, 11-5
Voters for Coach of the Year voters love QBs. They always have. Sean McVay in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. A third in 2022. When you fix a quarterback, you're halfway to winning the award.
Ben Johnson didn't merely fixed his young quarterback; he's unlocked him. In the right ecosystem, Williams has been afforded the chance to demonstrate his rare talent. Since Week 9, the Chicago offense sit at fourth in offensive EPA per play. This isn't a brief surge – it's consistent performance. Under Johnson, the quarterback has become increasingly decisive, far less careless, and has willingly submitted to the scheme instead of going rogue. It is an offense designed solely in the coach's image: a physical run game, a consistent helping of play-action and a imaginative passing attack that frees wide-open targets all over the field. Williams has taken advantage. And when easy reads haven't been available, he's been able to spin magic out of broken plays.
The coach came to the Bears with a specific offensive blueprint. Virtually every gamble – overhauling the trenches, highlighting the pass-catchers, turning Williams into a rhythm thrower – has succeeded. This is uncommon for a first-year skipper. And it's even more uncommon yet for a leader who entered the building with the immense expectations Johnson did. For consecutive straight cycles, he was the hottest candidate on the coaching market. But when it comes to selecting a head coach, there are zero sure things. Somehow, he has lived up to the hype – and even surpassed them. He's proven not just to be a offensive genius but the type of culture builder that can breathe new life into an organization.
In a ordinary year, Johnson would be the overwhelming favorite. Yet the current is not a normal season!
The area where Johnson's case runs slightly into trouble is on the defensive side. The Chicago defense currently rank in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are relying on takeaways, and turnovers are notoriously fickle. Defensive minds can stress ball disruption, but no one can ensure it. He is on the ballot because the offensive production is sustainable. He's ranked lower because variance is doing too much of the defense's heavy lifting. If not for a couple bounces of the ball, the Bears would be two victories behind. It's been an remarkable turnaround, and the foundation is in place for sustained success. However he comes up short in this ranking.
4) The Jacksonville Jaguars Coach, His Team, 12-4
Coen is in a similar spot to Johnson. He's another first-time head coach who has orchestrated a dramatic resurgence. During the stretch run of the year, he has his franchise quarterback playing the best all-around ball of his professional life. And he's also spearheaded the remaking of a defensive unit that now sits at fifth in the league in Expected Points Added per play.
Even more impressively, he has mastered the off-field stuff, which wasn't a certainty following his initial public introduction and some of his preseason decisions.
Coen took over the Jaguars with an exceptionally raw staff. Unlike other coaches, who surrounded their staff with the perfect coaching mix of youth and experience, he trusted newbies. From the leader himself to assistants to position coaches, the Jags are filled with first-timers. That type of setup is intriguing on paper, but frequently collapses in reality – with other teams are a cautionary tale – because everyone is figuring out a new job on the fly. Yet Coen has managed to bring the entire group and all elements together.
Following an initial strong beginning, there was a risk that the campaign would veer off the rails. A mid-year collapse had the team wobbling once more. That's usually when coaches panic and change too much. He didn't. Rather, he simplified the approach. Jacksonville stopped chasing explosive plays and started hunting reliable ones. The coach refocused the attack around his playmakers and the running game, and asked Lawrence to use his legs more.
The results are evident. The Jags have won seven games in a row and will be the AFC's number three seed. Coen receives the slightest deduction in the standings because he took over a skilled team, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that talent.
3) The Seattle Seahawks Coach, His Team, Their Record
Each Coach of the Year argument has a defining decision. For Mike Macdonald, it was his quarterback move.
Parting ways from a incumbent, signing a new signal-caller and partnering him with an innovative play-caller might have ended the season in the early weeks. Instead, it made it. By the mid point of the year, the new QB was an Most Valuable Player contender. He has regressed after that hot streak, dropping to 23rd in efficiency per pass attempt over the second half of the schedule, placing him only a single spot ahead of other QBs.
Still
