Art Rooney Sportsmanship Award: Luke Kuechly, LB, Carolina Panthers
Salute To Service Award: Andre Roberts, WR, Atlanta Falcons
Built Ford Tough Offensive Line of the Year: Philadelphia Eagles
Courtyard's Greatness on the Road Award: Deshaun Watson, QB, Houston Texans
Deacon Jones Award: Chandler Jones, LB, Arizona Cardinals
FedEx Air and Ground Players of the Year: Carson Wentz, QB, Philadelphia Eagles and Todd Gurley, RB, Los Angeles Rams
Bridgestone Elite Performance Play of the Year: Case Keenum to Stefon Diggs "Minneapolis Miracle," divisional round, Minnesota Vikings
Walter Payton NFL Man of the Year: J.J. Watt, DE, Houston Texans
AP Assistant Coach of the Year: Pat Shurmur, OC, Minnesota Vikings
AP Comeback Player of the Year: Keenan Allen, WR, Los Angeles Chargers
Last season was a rough one for the Chargers Keenan Allen. After missing all but one game in 2016 due to blowing out his ACL in his knee. This year, Allen came back and did so in a massive way. With 102 receptions for 1,393 yards and six touchdowns, Allen was among the NFL's top wideouts, and he earned the Comeback Player of the Year award. Not only did Allen bounce back from a devastating injury, but he also became a first-time Pro Bowler. After playing 16 games in a season for the first time in his career, Allen has a chance to establish himself as an elite wideout in 2018. With the type of year Allen had and what he went through a season ago, there was almost no way anybody else in the league but him was going to walk away with the award.
AP Defensive Rookie of the Year: Marshon Lattimore, CB, New Orleans Saints
When you are considered to be the top cornerback coming out of the draft, you had better live up to the hype. Boy did the Saints Marshon Lattimore do that this year, and in spades. It wasn't even close, there was really no competition fort Lattimore to win the top defensive rookie award. In 13 games this season, Lattimore finished with 52 tackles, 18 passes defended and five interceptions, one of which he returned for a touchdown, and was also named to the Pro Bowl. For as dynamic as New Orleans' offense was in 2017, its defensive improvement was the biggest reason the team won the NFC South and returned to the playoffs. One of the biggest reasons was Marshon lattimore.
AP Offensive Rookie of the Year: Alvin Kamara, RB, New Orleans Saints
This award had been a three horse race most of the year. DeShaun Watson of the Texans got one vote but could have been more if he hadn't hurt his knee and missed the 2nd half of the Texans season. It pretty much came down to Kamara of the Saints (28 votes) and Kareem Hunt of the Chiefs (21 votes) as to who was going to win top offensive rookie honors. Kamara had himself a fine season, finishing the year with 728 yards and eight touchdowns on the ground along with 81 receptions for 826 yards and five scores through the air. You could have made a strong case for Kareem Hunt with how well he ran, but there was a stretch during the season where Hunt had struggled to keep up the consistent play. Had Hunt been able to sustain that play from wire to wire, then I think he would have won the award
AP Defensive Player of the Year: Aaron Donald, DT, Los Angeles Rams
This one was a close race to pick, as Donald (23 votes) beat out Calais Campblle of Jacksonville (17 votes). It helped the Rams clean up at some of the awards this year, as Donald had missed two games all year, one because of a contract dispute and one to rest for the playoffs. Other then that, he played out of his mind this year for the NFC West Champions. He had 41 tackles, racked up 11.0 sacks and forced five fumbles. There's no further proof of how dominating he was then against Russel Wilson and the Seahawks in Seattle late in the season, a game in which he sacked Wilson three times.
AP Offensive Player of the Year: Todd Gurley, RB, Los Angeles Rams
This was one of those years for Todd Gurley of the Rams. He received 37 votes to walk away with the award, beating out Steelers wide receiver Antonio Brown (8 votes), Patriots quarterback Tom Brady (4 votes) and Texans wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins (1 vote). As the season went along, Gurley found one of his grooves, finishing the year with a league-best 2,093 scrimmage yards, which happened to be good for 35 percent of team's offensive output. Gurley finished second in league rushing with 1,305 yards, becoming only the third player in NFL history to tally 2,000 scrimmage yards, 10 rushing TDs and six receiving TDs, something that had only been done before by Hall of Famers Marshall Faulk and O.J. Simpson. Over his final four games of the regular season, Gurley had 440 rushing yards and five touchdowns along with 22 catches for 302 receiving yards and three touchdowns en route to NFC Offensive Player of the Month honors. There was nobody on the offensive side of the ball this year that had the ability to change a game this year the way Gurley did.
AP Coach of the Year: Sean McVay, Los Angeles Rams
This is a solid win for Sean MvVay (35 votes), who beat out Mike Zimmer of the Vikings (11 votes), Doug Marrone of the Jaguars (2 votes), Bill Belichick of the Patriots (1 vote) and Doug Pederson of the Eagles (1 vote). McVay is the youngest coach to win the award at 32 years old. This should have come as no surprise to people, just look at the job that McVay did with the Rams. A year ago, the Rams finished 4-12 (3rd in the NFC West two games better then the 49ers). Now this year, the Rams rebound to win the West at 11-5. It was one of the greatest turnarounds in league history, and McVay was the one at the helm of it. Some people were making the argument for Doug Pederson of the Eagles, because Philly won the Super Bowl with a lot of players out of their lineup. This award is for the regular season. The Eagles were a good team, but McVay turned the rams around in a big way, not only leading the team to a division title, but the Rams offense led league in scoring and they had their 1st winning season for team since 2003. Sean McVay was a very hands on coach with this team, in that he was not only calling the plays but was a big reason why both Jared Goff and Todd Gurley were playing at the level they were playing at during the year.
AP Most Valuable Player: Tom Brady, QB, New England Patriots
Brady (40 votes) beat out both Todd Gurley of the Rams (8 votes) and Carson Wentz of the Eagles (2 votes) to become the oldest MVP in all of professiona sports. Brady is 40 years and 6 months old, surpassing Barry Bonds (who was 40 years and 4 months) when Bonds won MVP in 2004. Brady had a solid year, completing 66.3 percent of his passes for 4,577 yards, 32 touchdowns and eight interceptions while leading the Pats to a 13-3 mark. This now marks the 3rd MVP award for Brady, tying him with Jim Brown and Brett Farve for the 2nd most in history. The only guy to win more MVP's then those three would be Peyton Manning, who won the award five times. This doesn't take away from what both Gurley and Wentz did with their respective teams. If Wentz had managed to be able to stay healthy the entire year, I think he might have had a better chance of possibly winning the award away from Brady. Still that's ont taking anything away from what Brady managed to do this year in New England. Not bad for a guy in his 40's.
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