"In practice, it's a yearly argument about expectations and whether we're rewarding actual coaching or just the greatest surprise. But this year's race is a little different. The pool of candidates is unusually deep. It's been the season of turnarounds. The league has been messy, with recent division winners falling away and recent also-rans all rising together. In an ordinary year, Sean Payton guiding the Broncos to the top"
"Coach of the Year voters love quarterbacks. They always have. Sean McVay in 2017. Kevin Stefanski in 2020. Brian Daboll in 2022. If you fix a quarterback, you're halfway home. Ben Johnson hasn't just fixed Caleb Williams; he's unlocked him. In the right ecosystem, Williams has been given a chance to showcase his otherworldly talent. Since Week 9, the Bears rank fourth in offensive EPA per play. That's not a hot streak it's sustained excellence."
The Coach of the Year award often functions as a mea culpa for incorrect preseason predictions, rewarding the coach who engineered the biggest turnaround. Voters debate whether the award honors coaching or surprise, and this season the field is unusually deep amid widespread turnarounds and upheaval among division powers. Sean Payton guiding the Broncos would be a conventional favorite, but multiple exceptional candidates contend. Ben Johnson in Chicago transformed Caleb Williams and built an offense that ranks fourth in offensive EPA per play since Week 9. Johnson's scheme emphasized a bully-ball run game, play-action, tight-end usage, rebuilt offensive line, and has turned Williams into a more decisive, rhythm passer.
Read at www.theguardian.com
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]