How The Unusual Season Broke the Conventional Coach of the Year Mould.
Typically, the NFL's Coach of the Year honor follows a straightforward formula. It commonly functions as a type of apology. Sorry we underestimated your team in our preseason predictions.
On paper, it's a clear-cut path: the skipper who engineered the most dramatic turnaround is handed the prize. In reality, it sparks an annual debate about expectations and whether we're actually rewarding excellent leadership or just the greatest surprise.
However this year's field is distinctly different. The list of nominees is unusually talented. It has been the season of comebacks. The NFL has been messy, with reigning division champions falling away and recent also-rans improving collectively. Under an normal season, a coach guiding the his team to the top of the AFC would make him the stone-cold front-runner. But in this chaotic and entertaining year, he's up against five other elite candidates.
Below is how the hypothetical ballot could be structured.
5) Ben Johnson, Chicago Bears, Their Record
Coach of the Year voters love quarterbacks. History shows this. A certain coach in 2017. Another in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. If you fix a quarterback, you're well on your way home.
Ben Johnson hasn't just corrected Caleb Williams; he's unleashed him. Within an ideal system, Williams has been afforded the opportunity to demonstrate his rare ability. From Week 9, the Bears sit at number four in offensive Expected Points Added per play. That's not a brief surge – it's consistent excellence. With Johnson, the quarterback has become more confident, less careless, and has willingly submitted to the gameplan rather than going rogue. It is an offense designed solely in Johnson's vision: a bully-ball ground attack, a consistent helping of play-action and a innovative aerial game that creates wide receiver targets all over the field. Williams has thrived. And when openings haven't been available, he's been capable to spin big plays out of nothing.
The coach came to Chicago with a clear offensive blueprint. Almost every bet – overhauling the offensive line, featuring the pass-catchers, turning the QB into a rhythm passer – has succeeded. That's uncommon for a rookie head coach. And it's even more uncommon still for a coach who walked into the building with the immense pressure Johnson did. For two straight offseasons, he was the hottest candidate on the coaching carousel. However when it comes to hiring a leader, there are no sure things. Somehow, Johnson has lived up to the hype – and even exceeded them. He's proven not only to be a scheme wizard but the kind of culture builder that can breathe new life into an franchise.
In a typical season, he would be the clear-cut favorite. Yet this isn't a typical season!
Where his candidacy runs a bit into trouble is on defense. The Bears presently rank 25th in defensive success rate. They are relying on turnovers, and takeaways are famously unreliable. Coaches can emphasise ball disruption, but nobody can ensure it. Johnson 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. With a few bounces of the ball, the Bears would be several wins worse off. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the foundation is in place for sustained winning. But he falls short here.
4) Liam Coen, His Team, Their Record
Coen is in a similar situation to his counterpart. He's another rookie leader who has orchestrated a rapid turnaround. Over the stretch run of the season, he has his franchise quarterback playing the finest overall ball of his professional life. And he's also overseen the transformation of a defense that now sits at number five in the league in EPA per play.
What's more impressively, Coen has mastered the off-field stuff, which wasn't a certainty following his early press conference appearances and some of his preseason decisions.
Coen took over the Jaguars with an exceptionally raw staff. In contrast to other coaches, who surrounded their staff with the perfect staff mix of new ideas and experience, Coen bet on first-timers. From the head coach on down to coordinators to position coaches, the Jags are stocked with rookies. That type of approach is intriguing on paper, but often collapses in reality – as past failures are a warning – because everyone is learning a new job in real-time. Yet Coen has managed to bring the entire group and all elements into sync.
After an early strong beginning, there was a risk that the campaign would veer off the track. A midseason collapse caused the Jags wobbling again. That's usually when leaders panic and change too much. Coen did not. Rather, he streamlined things. The offense stopped chasing explosive answers and started seeking consistent ones. The coach refocused the offense around his playmakers and the ground attack, and encouraged Lawrence to use his mobility more often.
The results are evident. The Jags have won seven games consecutively and will be the AFC's No 3 playoff seed. He gets the tiniest knock in the standings because he took over a skilled roster, but he has demonstrated he can maximize that talent.
3) Mike Macdonald, Seattle Seahawks, 13-3
Each Coach of the Year argument has a pivotal decision. For Mike Macdonald, it was his QB decision.
Parting ways from a veteran, signing a different signal-caller and partnering him with an new offensive coordinator could have derailed the campaign in the early weeks. Rather, it made it. By the middle point of the year, the new QB was an MVP candidate. He has regressed after that time, dropping to a lower rank in EPA per pass attempt over the second half of the schedule, putting him only one spot ahead of peers.
Still
