It's hard to believe, but half of the 2026 NFL season is in the books. Time flies! This season has brought some pleasant surprises, like the Browns and the Giants, and also some extreme disappointments (hello, Chargers).
With nine weeks in the books and nine still left to go, it's time to check in once again on the NFL awards races. The MVP race is still wide open, with five realistic candidates and a lot of new faces. Lamar Jackson, unfortunately, was taken out of the MVP running by injuries.
The Offensive Player of the Year race is also razor-thin, with different players around the league carrying their offenses in different ways.
There are so many different ways that these races can go over the next nine weeks. Let's check in with where they are now, how far they've come over the last month, and who to look out for during the second half of the season.
NFL MVP: Packers QB Jordan Love
Quarter-season pick: Chiefs RB Kenneth Walker
Honorable mention: Bengals QB Joe Burrow, Jaguars QB Trevor Lawrence, 49ers QB Brock Purdy, Bills QB Josh Allen
All five of these guys are all worthy candidates for the award, and all five might win it in a normal year. But all of them have been on fire this season and are leading some of the best offenses in the NFL, making this a very tough race to call. Burrow is playing the best football of his career, Lawrence is a hyper-efficient supercomputer on the most dominant team in football, Purdy is orchestrating the best offense in the league, and Allen is still the most unstoppable force in the NFL.
But Love gets the nod here for the amount of weight he has to carry in order for this Packers offense to run the way it does. Green Bay's offensive line is below average at best, especially after all of the injuries it has suffered. The running game is historically bad and ranks 32nd in the NFL in just about every relevant stat you will find.
Despite that, Love has this passing game absolutely humming, and the Packers have won five of their last six games as a result. through nine weeks, Love leads the league in passing yards and is third in passing touchdowns. He is ninth in EPA per dropback and just played arguably the best game of his career against a good Patriots defense on Sunday. Love is also navigating a brutal schedule against the toughest division in football. This could change by the week, but Love gets the nod for now.
Offensive Player of the Year: Seahawks WR Jaxon Smith-Njigba
Quarter-season pick: Seahawks WR Jaxon Smith-Njigba
Honorable mention: Lions RB Jahmyr Gibbs, Chiefs RB Kenneth Walker III
Smith-Njigba, Gibbs and Walker all have very compelling arguments for OPOY, and Puka Nacua would be right in the race if he didn't suffer a knee injury in Week 9. But JSN gets the nod here given his incredible efficiency and sheer volume on an offense that really doesn't have a whole lot of weapons outside of him.
Smith-Njigba is a legitimate triple crown contender at the halfway point. He is the only receiver with more than 1,000 yards this year, and also leads the league with nine receiving touchdowns. His 71 catches trail only Trey McBride. The former first-rounder is currently logging +0.57 EPA per target, the second-best mark in the NFL for players with at least 50 targets on the year. Take that with the context that Seattle has played most of the season without its top two running backs and a few games without Sam Darnold, and his season becomes even more impressive.
Gibbs is racking up incredible numbers on a very good Lions offense, but the sheer volume that he gets makes his burden incredibly heavy. Walker has completely transformed a Chiefs offense that was pretty hard to watch at times in 2025, giving Kansas City both the stability in the running game and the explosiveness in the open field that it has been missing. Both are right on JSN's heels, but the Seahawks star is in the lead for now.
Defensive Player of the Year: Texans EDGE Will Anderson Jr.
Quarter-season pick: Texans EDGE Will Anderson Jr.
Honorable mention: 49ers LB Fred Warner, Bears DT Jeffery Simmons
Sometimes, these things don't have to be complicated. Anderson is the best defensive player in football, and he has proved it in 2026 even on a Texans defense that has fallen short of expectations as a whole this year. He leads the league with 9.5 sacks through nine weeks, and his 44 pressures currently ranks second. Anderson has 19 quick pressures this season, which is tied for second in the league per Next Gen Stats. Anderson is also one of the best run-defending edge players in the league, with 30 run stops on the year.
Warner is a generational linebacker who still makes big play after big play for one of the NFL's best defenses, giving him a compelling case. Simmons was incredibly productive as an iron-man defensive tackle for the Titans, and now he is turning around a Bears defense that was pretty leaky before his arrival. If he continues to produce and Chicago keeps shutting teams down, he will have a very interesting on/off numbers argument that you don't often see in NFL award races.
Coach of the Year: John Harbaugh, Giants
Quarter-season pick: Klint Kubiak, Raiders
Honorable mention: Browns HC Todd Monken, 49ers HC Kyle Shanahan
Harbaugh has to be the runaway favorite for this award at this point in the season, even with the incredible job that Monken has done in Cleveland. The Giants lost Jaxson Dart in Week 2 to a season-ending injury, and yet they still have a comfortable lead in the NFC East at the halfway point. New York brought in J.J. McCarthy in a midseason trade and has him playing competent football at this point, and there is a real chance this team ends up in the playoffs.
So far in 2026, Harbaugh has put all of his signature stamps on this team. The Giants are disciplined and play hard, with a talented front seven and a physical identity on both sides of the football.
Offensive Rookie of the Year: Browns WR KC Concepcion
Quarter-season pick: Browns WR Denzel Boston
Honorable mention: Browns WR Denzel Boston, Titans WR Carnell Tate, Broncos RB Jonah Coleman
Both Browns receivers deserve mention here, as both Boston and Concepcion have been a major part of Cleveland's turnaround and are the clear top pass-catchers in this Browns offense. Concepcion just barely gets the nod midseason thanks to some more efficient numbers. He is currently sitting at +0.22 EPA per target, and he is catching more than two-thirds of his targets while Boston is catching just over half.
If I were to pick a year-end winner at this point, however, it would be Coleman. The Broncos running back missed a lot of time early in the season and doesn't have the numbers to get the midseason nod as a result, but he is emerging as the feature back in Sean Payton's offense. Coleman is sure to have a ton of volume in the coming weeks, which could allow him to jump to the top of the pile here.
Defensive Rookie of the Year: Giants LB Arvell Reese
Quarter-season pick: Raiders CB Hezekiah Masses
Honorable mention: Commanders LB Sonny Styles, Jets EDGE David Bailey, Dolphins LB Jacob Rodriguez
Arvell Reese is a freak, which we knew coming out of college, but he has put it on display each and every week in his rookie season. The young Giants star ranks third among rookies in sacks with four and fourth in tackles with 48. He also has 32 stops, defined by PFF as a tackle that results in a failure for the offense, also second among rookies.
On Sunday in a win over the Eagles, Reese had the best game of his young career. He finished with 12 tackles, three sacks and a forced fumble and is now the firm favorite for the Defensive Rookie of the Year as a result. Keep an eye out for David Bailey, who was a game-wrecker on Sunday against the Chiefs and leads all rookies with eight sacks this season.
Comeback Player of the Year: Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes
Quarter-season pick: Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes
Honorable mention: Rams DT Aaron Donald, Falcons QB Michael Penix Jr.
Mahomes is still the easy choice here, just as he was at the quarter-season mark. The Chiefs signal-caller magically made it back from a torn ACL suffered late last season and was ready for training camp. While he hasn't been at his absolute peak this season, Mahomes has still ben very good despite a lackluster receiving corps and is leading a Chiefs team that looks destined for a playoff spot.
Donald's comeback has been improbable and deserves mention, but the production will have to ramp up significantly for him to catch Mahomes during the second half of the season.