It's extremely difficult to judge coaches. The majority of a coach's work takes place off screen, away from the public view, and in many cases before a football is even snapped in anger. The one tangible thing we get to judge with coaches is their decision-making during those moments when the camera zooms in as they read their call sheets and the announcers hush and wait to agree with whatever they decide to do.

Judging those decisions -- even though we directly see how they play out on the field -- is also tough. It's too easy to criticize a coach who goes for it on fourth-and-short and fails, even if the play he calls manages to scheme somebody open. And likewise, a coach who punts in a situation calling for aggressiveness, as Pete Carroll did last week, might push the opposition back to the 1-yard line and see them march down the field anyway. You have to separate the decision to try a conversion or kick a field goal from the actual way the game subsequently played out, which isn't our nature as fans, analysts or humans.

By making those decisions, though, coaches can have an enormous impact on winning and losing games. All the work a coach puts in during those 80-hour weeks can be for naught if he makes a hyperconservative call and swings his win expectancy negatively by 30 to 40 percent on game day. There's no other equivalent thing a coach could do during the week that would be similarly damaging, outside of telling his starting quarterback to stay home or preventing anybody from watching film.

Let's take a step back through the recent history of the four coaches remaining in this year's playoffs and sort through who we would want on the sidelines if it were our favorite team lining up in the conference championship game.

To be clear, though, this is strictly an analysis of decision-making. We're not arguing about who does a better job of installing an offense or teaching players fundamentals, because that happens out of view. And with these four, there's an obvious candidate in first place and an obvious one in last place, even if his team came through despite some sloppy decision-making last week ...

Dan Quinn and the Falcons squeezed out a 33-32 win over Mike McCarthy and the Packers in October. Scott Cunningham/Getty Images

4. Mike McCarthy, Green Bay Packers

McCarthy has struggled with game management in key situations during previous playoffs. As I wrote about on Sunday, McCarthy has shown little aptitude for handling his team's fourth-quarter decisions, particularly as an underdog.

Against the Seahawks two years ago, McCarthy kicked twice on fourth-and-goal from the 1-yard line in the first quarter, then clung to a bizarre emphasis on the number of carries his team should have in the second half in an attempt to hold on to the lead. Then, last season in the divisional round of the playoffs, he followed Aaron Rodgers' miraculous Hail Mary on the road in Arizona by kicking the extra point to go into overtime in lieu of attacking a stunned Cardinals defense for a game-winning two-point conversion try. His team never touched the ball again.

You might argue that McCarthy was unlucky to lose the coin toss and have his defense give up a season-ending touchdown within three plays from scrimmage after his decision to kick the extra point, that it was the worst possible outcome for his decision. That's fair. It's also fair to say he got the best possible outcome for making the same sort of bizarrely conservative mistake again last Sunday against the Cowboys.

Again, playing as an underdog on the road, McCarthy's team took an early lead before beginning to scuffle in the second half. The Packers failed to score on two consecutive drives, which was enough to let Dallas back into the game for what turned into a 28-28 tie with 4:12 left. A pass-interference penalty set up the Packers on the Cowboys' 35-yard line with 1:52 to go. The Cowboys had all three of their timeouts, but with Rodgers at the helm, the Packers could move further into field goal range, burn off significant clock or force Dallas to use their timeouts.

Somehow, they ended up with the worst of all three worlds. Instead of trusting their MVP-caliber quarterback to make plays and keep the ball in bounds, the Packers turned their offense over to Ty Montgomery, who ran the ball twice for a combined loss of 3 yards. Faced with third-and-long, Rodgers ended up throwing a deep incomplete pass on a play where there was no outlet for a short gain to make Mason Crosby's field goal any easier, with three of the four receivers running 15-plus yards downfield.

Crosby was left with a 56-yard field goal, having gone just 28-of-54 from 50-plus yards during his career. Was the kick in Crosby's range? Yes, in the way that a 30-footer might still be considered to be in Klay Thompson's range, even if he's far less likely to make that shot than he would a 23-footer. Coaches often treat "field goal range" like a binary proposition, feeling safe once they get to a certain yard line, even though all kickers improve dramatically as you get closer to the end zone. The Packers did burn two Dallas timeouts, but they lost 3 yards while leaving 1:38 and one timeout on the clock for the Cowboys. They were in worse shape than they had been on first down.

As much as McCarthy makes mistakes, it's more the way he runs through those decisions that is troubling. It's one thing for McCarthy to throw out the challenge flag at the wrong time, as he did in 2012. It's another to say after the game that he wanted to hit a particular number of carries from his running game in the second half, which is a logical fallacy. McCarthy surely has his merits as an offensive mind and has done a great job of developing Rodgers, but his in-game decision-making already has cost the Packers dearly in the playoffs in the past and nearly came back to haunt them last weekend.

Dan Quinn is 19-13 in the regular season and 1-0 in the playoffs as coach of the Falcons. Photo by Dustin Bradford/Getty Images

3. Dan Quinn, Atlanta Falcons

Quinn is still a relative unknown in terms of how he handles in-game decision-making, if only because the former Seahawks defensive coordinator hasn't really faced many critical game-management situations during his two years as coach. His game against the Seahawks last week was out of hand by the middle of the third quarter, in part because opposite number Carroll made mistakes of his own. Quinn's mostly empty slate is preferable to the obvious, glaring mistakes McCarthy has made during his run in charge of the Packers.

The most concerning Quinn decision in recent memory came last season. Down 17-13 to the 49ers and facing a fourth-and-1 on the San Francisco 4-yard line with three minutes to go, Quinn bizarrely chose to kick a field goal and try to regain possession instead of attempting to convert for a first down against one of the league's worst defenses. His Falcons never got the ball back and lost. Quinn suggested after the game that he thought his defense was capable of forcing a three-and-out to return the ball to his offense, but even if he had the '85 Bears, the numbers were strongly in favor of going for it. NumberFire suggested Quinn's decision reduced Atlanta's win expectancy by 37.3 percent even after the field goal was made, dropping them from a 50.7 percent favorite to a 13.4 percent underdog.

This season, with the league's best offense, Quinn has rightfully been more aggressive. Atlanta went for it 13 times on fourth down while the game was within 14 points or less, tied for the eighth-most times in the league. The Falcons went 7-for-13 on those tries, a 53.9 percent mark that comes in right around the league average of 51.4 percent. While some of those were desperate plays to extend games, Quinn had moments of genuine aggressiveness, most of which came in the no man's land between midfield and Matt Bryant's field goal range. He notably went for it on fourth-and-1 on Atlanta's 45-yard line on the opening possession of overtime against San Diego, only to be stuffed and end up losing the game on the next drive. It was the correct call, even if the move didn't pay off.

One notable time Quinn went for it on fourth-and-1 was on the opening possession against the Packers in Week 8. It was on the Packers' 42-yard line, but Quinn could have sent out his punting unit and nobody would have batted an eye. After Matt Ryan overcame a pair of illegal-formation penalties by picking up 19 yards on third-and-20, Quinn rewarded his offense by leaving it on the field for fourth down. Devonta Freeman ran for 17 yards. The drive ended in a field goal that proved to be valuable in what ended up as a 33-32 nail-biter.

Quinn has to coach this game against the Packers with a specific scoring environment in mind. The Falcons-Packers game has a Vegas point total of 61, projecting it to be the highest-scoring playoff game and the second-highest scoring NFL game since 1978. With that in mind, Quinn can't settle for field goals, and he can't be excessively concerned about field position. In a game in which teams should be able to move the ball 30 yards in the blink of an eye, possession (not field position) is king.

Steelers coach Mike Tomlin is 2-5 against Bill Belichick and the Patriots since he became coach in 2007. Justin K. Aller/Getty Images

2. Mike Tomlin, Pittsburgh Steelers

The right word to describe Tomlin's in-game management is "inscrutable." Tomlin seemingly has no pattern to when or why he decides to get aggressive, which doesn't mean that there isn't a pattern, but merely that it is beyond my purview. And no, I'm not talking about Chris Boswell's totally defensible rabona attempt at an onside kick.

It's more the fake punts when there doesn't really seem to be any rhyme or reason for one. And Tomlin's two-point logic remains confoundingly weird. He's right to think the Steelers have a great offense, and blessed with Le'veon Bell and a dominant offensive line, Pittsburgh should be going for two more often than just about any other team in the league. And over the past two years, they have. During the first three quarters of games -- before most teams are willing to consider going for two -- the Steelers have gone for two 15 times, converting on 10 of those tries. No other team has attempted more than five.

The weird part is that the Steelers don't really push the envelope. They go for two once in the first half, succeed, and then stop. Pittsburgh has gone for two more than once before the fourth quarter in a game on only two occasions; it tried (and succeeded) twice against the 49ers last season, and then failed on consecutive attempts against the Cowboys earlier this season. Are the Steelers concerned that their subsequent attempts won't be as likely to succeed? Do they only go for it in the hopes of gaining an advantage and not want to press their luck? It's hard to find the logic in why the Steelers would think they should go for two once but never again.

Even if the process is opaque and inconsistent, on the whole, Tomlin is more aggressive than a typical coach in a way that plays to his team's strengths. He should stay that course on Sunday. It would be wise for the Steelers to get aggressive with their two-point decisions in the hopes of creating an advantage against the Patriots. As the underdogs, they will have to take risks to try to win. It's better to take that risk on a play worth two points with all of your offensive weapons on the field than it is on a fake punt or field goal.

The one other concern with Tomlin is that he may get carried away with challenges, although that's less of a concern under the league's modern rules. He made a terrible mistake with challenges earlier in his career during a playoff game against the Ravens in 2010. Tomlin challenged a bad spot on the Ravens' return of the opening kickoff, and while he was right, the ball moved only from the Baltimore 49-yard line to its 35-yard line. It was a modest gain with 56 minutes of time to challenge left. Later in the first quarter, the Ravens recovered a Ben Roethlisberger fumble for a touchdown on a close play Tomlin had to challenge. He lost and was then out of challenges with three quarters to go.

Bill Belichick has four Super Bowl titles and is 24-10 in the playoffs since joining the Patriots in 2000. AP Photo/Charles Krupa, File

1. Bill Belichick, New England Patriots

Belichick, meanwhile, is just about the gold standard of NFL coaches in terms of decision-making, with only John Harbaugh of the Ravens looming as an obviously more aggressive coach. Belichick obviously has a strong weapon in Tom Brady and his ability to convert on fourth-and-short, either with concise passing or with one of Brady's many successful sneaks. The future Hall of Famer is now 107-for-119 (90.0 percent) trying to convert on third or fourth down with 2 yards or less to go with his legs.

The one problem that has popped up, most noticeably in the Super Bowl, has been Belichick's somewhat erratic timeout usage late in games. While some will claim in hindsight that Belichick was a genius to let the clock run against the Seahawks as they lined up for what looked to be a Super Bowl-winning score, it took a small miracle to stop Seattle, and the Patriots would surely have been better-positioned after a score had they used their timeouts. Arguments to the contrary are driven by hindsight and dubious.

Belichick saved his timeouts until after the two-minute warning against the Cardinals in Week 1 this season and had it work out again; the Patriots nursed a two-point lead, sweating out a potential game-winning Chandler Catanzaro 46-yard field goal attempt -- a dangerous game for a guy who had been 16-of-18 on kicks between 40 and 49 yards up to that point. Catanzaro missed, bailing out Belichick yet again.

That's a relatively minor fault, though, and Belichick often puts his team in the best position to win with his fourth-down and late-game decisions. The famous fourth-and-2 call against the Colts ended up going against the Patriots but made sense given the quality of the two legendary offenses in that game at the time. While the numbers in a vacuum were inconclusive, Belichick rightly chose to back his already-legendary quarterback with the game on the line instead of his defense. The guy who pulled the intentional safety and the dropkick out of mothballs is still lurking on the sideline, though, and it would be foolish to assume he won't try something unconventional if he thinks it will work. His creativity and aggressiveness make him the most trustworthy coach in close situations in the postseason.