How The Strange Campaign Broke the Traditional Coach of the Year Mould.
Usually, the National Football League's Head Coach of the Year honor adheres to a simple pattern. It frequently functions as a kind of apology. We regret we got wrong your team in our preseason forecasts.
In theory, it's a clear-cut line: the skipper who oversaw the biggest improvement receives the prize. In reality, it fuels an annual debate about expectations and whether we're actually honoring excellent coaching or just the most shocking upset.
Yet this year's field is distinctly different. The list of nominees is exceptionally talented. It has been the year of comebacks. The NFL has been unpredictable, with reigning conference champions fading and longtime strugglers ascending in unison. During an normal year, Sean Payton guiding the his team to the summit of the AFC would make him the clear favorite. Yet in this turbulent and fun year, he's facing several other exceptional coaches.
Below is how the hypothetical vote ought to shake out.
5) Ben Johnson, His Team, Their Record
Coach of the Year voters adore quarterbacks. They always have. Sean McVay in 2017. Another in 2020. A third in 2022. Should you transform a franchise QB, you're well on your way to winning the award.
The Bears' head coach hasn't just fixed his young quarterback; he's freed him. Given a proper environment, Williams has been afforded the opportunity to demonstrate his rare talent. Since midseason onward, the Bears sit at fourth in offensive Expected Points Added per play. This isn't a brief surge – it's consistent performance. With his guidance, the quarterback has become more confident, far less careless, and has eagerly surrendered to the system rather than going rogue. It is an offense constructed solely in Johnson's vision: a bully-ball run game, a consistent dose of play-action and a innovative passing attack that frees wide-open receivers everywhere. The QB has taken advantage. And when openings weren't available, he's been capable to conjure magic out of broken plays.
Johnson came to the Bears with a specific offensive blueprint. Almost every bet – overhauling the trenches, featuring the tight ends, turning Williams into a timing-based thrower – has succeeded. That's rare for a rookie head coach. And it's rarer still for a leader who entered the organization with the immense pressure he did. For two straight cycles, he was the most sought-after name on the head coaching carousel. But when it comes to hiring a head coach, there are zero sure things. Remarkably, Johnson has met expectations – and even surpassed them. He's demonstrated not only to be a offensive dork but the type of leader that can inject fresh energy into an franchise.
In a typical year, Johnson would be the clear-cut choice. But the current is not a normal year!
The area where Johnson's case comes slightly into trouble is on defense. The Chicago defense presently rank in the bottom third in defensive success rate. They are surviving on turnovers, and turnovers are famously unreliable. Defensive minds can emphasise creating turnovers, but no one can guarantee it. He is on the list because the offensive production is legitimate. He's not higher because luck is doing too much of the defensive work. With a few bounces of the ball, the Bears would be two victories worse off. It's been an remarkable transformation, and the foundation is in place for sustained winning. However he falls short in this ranking.
4) Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars, 12-4
Coen is in a similar position to Johnson. He's a fellow rookie leader who has masterminded a dramatic turnaround. Over the crucial final weeks of the season, he has Trevor Lawrence playing the best all-around football of his professional life. And he's also overseen the transformation of a defense that now ranks fifth in the NFL in Expected Points Added per play.
What's more notably, he has mastered the leadership aspects, which wasn't a guarantee following his initial public introduction and some of his offseason decisions.
Coen took over the Jaguars with an exceptionally raw staff. Unlike other coaches, who packed their staff with the perfect staff cocktail of new ideas and experience, he hired first-timers. Starting with the head coach on down to coordinators to position coaches, the Jags are filled with rookies. That kind of setup is exciting in theory, but often collapses in practice – as past failures are a cautionary tale – because everyone is figuring out a their job in real-time. Yet Coen has managed to bring everyone and everything into sync.
After an early strong beginning, there was a chance that the campaign would go off the rails. A midseason collapse had the Jags stumbling once more. That's usually when leaders overcorrect. He didn't. Instead, he simplified the approach. Jacksonville stopped chasing explosive plays and started hunting reliable ones. The coach recentered the attack around key players and the running game, and encouraged his QB to use his legs more often.
The outcomes are evident. The Jags have won seven games in a row and will be the conference's No 3 seed. He gets the slightest knock in the standings because he inherited a skilled roster, but he has proven he can get the most out of that talent.
3) The Seattle Seahawks Coach, His Team, 13-3
Every Coach of the Year case has a defining decision. For the Seahawks coach, it was his QB move.
Moving on from a incumbent, bringing in a new signal-caller and partnering him with an innovative offensive coordinator could have derailed the season in the early weeks. Rather, it made it. Through the middle point of the season, the new QB was an MVP front-runner. He has regressed since that hot streak, dropping to 23rd in EPA per dropback over the second half of the season, putting him just a single spot ahead of peers.
Still
