By Tom Pelissero, NFL Network Insider
My annual early awards survey was completed this week by high-ranking executives from 30 NFL teams, including 21 general managers. All 30 individuals participated on the condition of anonymity for competitive reasons and to provide an honest assessment.
Who are the big winners in seven notable categories? Here’s a rundown, with help from statistics compiled by NFL Media researcher Ben Peake.
Most Valuable Player
Stafford outdistanced the field with 18 votes as he closes out perhaps the best season of his illustrious career. At age 37, Stafford leads the NFL in passing yards (4,179), touchdown passes (40) and passer rating (112.1) for the 11-4 Rams. He has thrown just five interceptions — the type of ratio that helped Aaron Rodgers win four MVPs in Green Bay. Stafford’s passer rating of 132.0 on deep throws (20-plus air yards) and 127.9 against the blitz are both best in the NFL. And he’s gotten even hotter down the stretch, throwing at least two passing touchdowns in nine straight games — a Rams record and the longest such streak in his career.
Patriots quarterback Drake Maye was the runner-up with five votes. Still just 23 years old and in his second NFL season, Maye leads the NFL with a 70.9% completion percentage — topping Tom Brady’s franchise-record 68.9% in 2007 — and would be the youngest player ever to the lead the NFL in that category. (Joe Montana was 24 when he completed 64.5% of his passes in 1980.) Along with the arrival of head coach Mike Vrabel, Maye’s growth is a big reason the Patriots have made the biggest jump in total wins from last season (4-13 in 2024 to 12-3 with two games to go this season).
Bills quarterback Josh Allen, the reigning AP NFL MVP, got four votes. Browns defensive end Myles Garrett got two. Chargers quarterback Justin Herbert received one.
Offensive Player of the Year
Smith-Njigba received 15 votes on the strength of his league-leading 1,637 receiving yards and 10 touchdowns on 104 receptions — his second straight season in triple-digits. He has done it on a Seahawks team that passes just 51% of the time, third-fewest in the NFL. Still only 23 years old, JSN is responsible for 44% of the Seahawks’ receiving yards this season, which would be the highest single-season share since Brandon Marshall had 45.7% with the Bears in 2012.
Matthew Stafford received six votes in this category as well, making him the runner-up. Allen and Falcons running back Bijan Robinson got two each. Bills running back James Cook, Seahawks quarterback Sam Darnold, Maye, Rams receiver Puka Nacua and Colts running back Jonathan Taylor each got one.
Defensive Player of the Year
This was virtually unanimous, and with good reason. Garrett (28 votes) is one sack shy of breaking the NFL’s single-season record with two games to go — a remarkable feat even without mentioning that he plays on a 3-12 team that hasn’t exactly maximized his pass-rush opportunities. Garrett leads the NFL with 22 sacks, seven more than the next player (the Giants’ Brian Burns with 15). He also leads the NFL with 32 tackles for loss (the most since J.J. Watt had 39 in 2012), ranks second in QB hits (36) and is sixth in QB pressures (65), despite being chipped on 26.5% of his pass rush snaps, per Next Gen Stats. Garrett won AP NFL Defensive Player of the Year in 2023 with fewer sacks, TFLs and QB hits than he has recorded already this season. Days away from his 30th birthday, Garrett has raised the bar again.
Broncos cornerback Patrick Surtain II, the reigning AP NFL Defensive Player of the Year, and Packers edge Micah Parsons received one vote each.
Offensive Rookie of the Year
The No. 8 overall pick in April’s draft, McMillan was the runaway winner here with 17 votes. He leads all rookies with 924 receiving yards, seven receiving touchdowns and 43 receptions of 10-plus yards; his 65 total catches rank third among first-year pros. And while some rookies hit the proverbial wall, “T-Mac” just seems to be getting better — he has five touchdowns in the Panthers’ past five games as they’ve surged into the NFC South lead.
Nine other players split the rest of the votes: Colts tight end Tyler Warren (3), Bucs receiver Emeka Egbuka (2), Patriots running back TreVeyon Henderson (1.5), Saints quarterback Tyler Shough (1.5), Patriots tackle Will Campbell (1), Giants quarterback Jaxson Dart (1), Raiders running back Ashton Jeanty (1), Browns running back Quinshon Judkins (1) and Seahawks guard Grey Zabel (1).
Defensive Rookie of the Year
It was a landslide win for Schwesinger, who received 23 votes. The second-round pick (33rd overall) from UCLA emerged as an instant star in Cleveland, leading all rookies (and ranking seventh in the NFL overall) with 137 tackles. He also has 11 tackles for loss (most among rookies), two interceptions, 2.5 sacks and nine QB hits. And he’s done it all while wearing the green dot as the signal-caller for the Browns’ defense. The last team to have the Defensive Player of the Year and Rookie of the Year on the same team was the 2003 Ravens, with Ray Lewis and Terrell Suggs; the Browns now appear poised to do it with Garrett and Schwesinger, who might be the best find of Cleveland’s excellent rookie class.
Falcons edge James Pearce Jr., the No. 26 overall pick who has come on recently with eight sacks in his past seven games, was the runner-up with three votes. Giants edge Abdul Carter and Seahawks safety Nick Emmanwori each got two.
Coach of the Year
Despite a strong list of candidates, Vrabel (13 votes) more than doubled the vote total of the second-place finisher, Bears coach Ben Johnson (six).
It has been an instant turnaround in New England, where the Patriots are 12-3, playoff-bound and in the mix for the AFC’s No. 1 seed after winning eight games over the previous two years combined. No surprise, considering Vrabel, the 2021 AP Coach of the Year, engineered a similarly speedy turnaround in his first head coaching job in Tennessee. The offense and defense that ranked 30th and 22nd in points per game last season, respectively, now are seventh in each category. Drake Maye is playing like an MVP candidate. Vrabel has flipped the Patriots’ culture basically overnight and is fully in command on game days.
The Bears’ immediate success under Johnson also has been striking. After making the playoffs just twice in the past 14 seasons and not once since 2020, Chicago is headed back to the postseason and has a shot at the NFC’s No. 1 seed after last week’s dramatic win over rival Green Bay — their sixth comeback win when trailing at or after the 2-minute warning, the most by any team in a single season since at least 1983. Quarterback Caleb Williams has made a big leap in Year 2. And Johnson’s situational expertise has been almost as impressive as his well-known offensive creativity.
Liam Coen, who has led the Jaguars to an 11-4 mark and a playoff spot in his first season behind improving play from quarterback Trevor Lawrence, received four votes. 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan got 3.5 votes for his work pulling an injury-ravaged 49ers roster to the playoffs at 11-4. Seahawks coach Mike Macdonald, whose team has the NFC’s best record at 12-3 and the NFL’s second-ranked scoring defense (18.6 points per game) in his second season, received 2.5 votes. Broncos coach Sean Payton got one.
Executive of the Year
It’s rare to have a landslide in this category, so Schneider’s runaway win with 19.5 votes speaks to how impressed his counterparts have been with the Seahawks’ build.
No move this offseason was bolder than Seattle’s QB swap, trading veteran starter Geno Smith to Las Vegas for a third-round pick and replacing him with Sam Darnold, who has been well worth the $37.5 million he’s making this season. But that’s just part of the reboot Schneider has executed since the team parted ways with Pete Carroll in January 2024. He ran the process that led to the hiring of Mike Macdonald, who is 22-10 and still one of the NFL’s youngest head coaches at age 38. His last two drafts have produced impact players, including defensive tackle Byron Murphy, guard Grey Zabel, tight end AJ Barner and safety Nick Emmanwori. Trading veteran receiver DK Metcalf to Pittsburgh in March netted an extra second-round pick and cleared the way for the breakout of Jaxon Smith-Njigba. Other key trades landed a standout linebacker (Ernest Jones) and speed receiving threat (Rashid Shaheed); Shaheed’s punt return touchdown was a huge swing play in last week’s win over the Rams. Never afraid to use all avenues for team building, Schneider was the architect of the Seahawks teams that went to back-to-back Super Bowls with the “Legion of Boom” a decade ago and now appears to have built another juggernaut.
Schneider’s one-time Green Bay colleague, Patriots executive vice president of player personnel Eliot Wolf, was the runner-up, with four votes. Wolf played a key role in the scouting and drafting of Drake Maye last year. Working with Vrabel, he hit on an important (and expensive) free agent class led by receiver Stefon Diggs, offensive linemen Morgan Moses and Garrett Bradbury, defensive tackle Milton Williams, linebackers Harold Landry and Robert Spillane and cornerback Carlton Davis. And the draft resources the Patriots poured into surrounding Maye this year have produced immediate dividends, with left tackle Will Campbell, running back TreVeyon Henderson, receiver Kyle Williams and center Jared Wilson being scooped up in the first three rounds.
Others receiving votes included: Broncos GM George Paton (2), Jaguars GM James Gladstone (1), Chargers GM Joe Hortiz (1), Steelers GM Omar Khan (1), 49ers President of Football Operations/GM John Lynch (1) and Rams GM Les Snead (.5).