Dennis Green
Dennis Green coached the Minnesota Vikings from 1992 to 2001, leading them to eight playoff appearances in nine years.
Dennis Earl Green (February 17, 1949 – July 22, 2016) was an American professional football coach. During his National Football League (NFL) career, Green coached the Minnesota Vikings from 1992 to 2001 and the Arizona Cardinals from 2004 to 2006. He coached the Vikings to eight playoff appearances in nine years, despite having seven different starting quarterbacks in those postseasons. He was posthumously inducted into the Minnesota Vikings Ring of Honor in 2018.
- Role
- Head Coach
- Tenure
- 1992–2000
- Stadium
- Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome
- Key Players
- Cris Carter, Randy Moss, Randall Cunningham
- Peak Achievement
- NFC Championship Game (1998)
- Status
- Former Coach
Lore & Background
Green was the second African American head coach in modern NFL history, after Art Shell. He was one of the winningest coaches of the 1990s, posting a 97–62 record as Vikings head coach. Green's best season in Minnesota was in 1998, when the Vikings finished 15–1 and set the NFL record for most points in a season at the time; however, the Vikings were upset by the Atlanta Falcons in that year's NFC Championship Game, and Green was unable to reach the Super Bowl throughout his otherwise successful tenure with Minnesota. Following his first losing record in 2001, he was fired just before the final game of the season.
In Their Own Story
The air inside the Metrodome hummed with electricity during the fourth quarter of the 1998 divisional round game. Dennis Green paced the sideline, his headset tight against his ear, watching Randall Cunningham connect downfield. The purple sea of fans chanted in unison, a sound that vibrated through the concrete bowl. For this moment, under the dome lights, everything felt possible.
Reader's Guide
Green grew up in a working class household in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. He attended John Harris High School and graduated cum laude from the University of Iowa with a BS in Recreational Studies. In college, he started as halfback for the Iowa Hawkeyes. In 1969, Green led a boycott of spring practice by sixteen black players protesting the suspension of two black players. The players were dismissed but later some were reinstated. Green was passed over in the 1971 NFL draft due to his leadership in the boycott. He briefly played for the BC Lions of the Canadian Football League in 1971 before beginning his coaching career.
Did You Know?
- Green was the second African American head coach in modern NFL history, after Art Shell.
- He coached the Vikings to eight playoff appearances in nine years with seven different starting quarterbacks.
- Green's 1998 Vikings set the NFL record for most points in a season at the time.
- He was posthumously inducted into the Minnesota Vikings Ring of Honor in 2018.
- Green led a 1969 boycott of spring practice at the University of Iowa over racial issues.
More in Club History & Eras
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