 NORM VAN BROCKLIN
(from The Pro Football HOF )
1961-1966 (29-51-4)Norm Van Brocklin was selected as the first head coach in franchise history. Norm was a standout quarterback for 12 seasons in the National Football League, the first nine with the Los Angeles Rams. Then he was traded to the Philadelphia Eagles in 1958 and, within three years, the “Dutchman” had guided the Eagles to the NFL championship.
Without a doubt it was his finest performance in a brilliant career. One of the most colorful and competitive individuals that pro football has ever seen, Van Brocklin blazed a sometimes stormy, but always eventful path in his dozen campaigns as an active player.
Norm left the University of Oregon, where he still had a year's eligibility remaining, to join the Rams in 1949. The only problem, from Van Brocklin's standpoint, was that the Rams already had one future Hall of Fame quarterback in Bob Waterfield.
The net result was that two great quarterbacks had to share passing duties for a few seasons, a situation that any great competitor, which Norm certainly was, couldn't be expected to accept with any enthusiasm. Still, Van Brocklin won the NFL passing title in both 1950 and 1952, even though he was playing only half of the time on offense. He added a third passing championship in 1954.
His greatest day as a passer came in 1951 when he threw for a record 554 yards against the New York Yanks. It was also in 1951 that Van Brocklin threw a 73-yard pass to Tom Fears that gave the Rams a 24-17 victory over the Browns and the only NFL title the Rams had won since moving to Los Angeles.
In Philadelphia he was given a free hand at running the offensive show, and behind his leadership the Eagles won the NFL title in 1960. Thus, the “Dutchman” was the only man to defeat a Lombardi-coached Green Bay team in championship game play.
 BUD GRANT
1967-1983, 1985 (151-87-5)
In Bud Grant's 18 years as head coach of the Minnesota Vikings from1967 through 1983 and a one-year final stint in 1985, his teams compiled a .620 winning percentage (158-96-5) in regular-season play. His 168 coaching triumphs, counting 10 post-season wins, place him among the all-time greatest coaches.
At the time of his retirement, only George Halas, Don Shula, Tom Landry, Curly Lambeau, Chuck Noll, Chuck Knox and Paul Brown had engineered more wins in pro football play. Grant, who had just completed a 10-year -tenure as head coach of the highly successful Winnipeg Blue Bombers of the Canadian Football League, took over the Vikings in 1967.
In just his second season in 1968, he launched the Vikings on a string of championship seasons rarely equaled in sports competition. From 1968 through 1978, the Vikings won the NFL/NFC Central Division 10 times in 11 seasons, missing only in 1972. During that span, the Vikings won the 1969 NFL championship and NFC titles in 1973, 1974 and 1976.
Grant's Minnesota teams appeared in four Super Bowls. An NFC Central title in 1980 gave Grant a total of 11 championship teams. Born May 20, 1927, in Superior, Wisconsin, Grant became a nine-letterman athlete at the University of Minnesota. He was a two time All-Big Ten end in football, a two-year baseball star and a three-year basketball regular.
Although a first-round draft choice of the Philadelphia Eagles in 1950, Grant postponed his NFL debut to play for the Minneapolis Lakers of the NBA. He played two years with the Lakers, who won the NBA title each year. In 1951, Bud turned to pro football with the Eagles. He played on defense as a rookie and then became the No. 2 pass receiver in the NFL with 56 catches in 1952.
 LES STECKEL
1984 (3-13-0)
Les Steckel (born July 1, 1946) was a coach of the Minnesota Vikings for one brief season in 1984. He has also worked as an assistant coach with the San Francisco 49ers, New England Patriots, Denver Broncos, Tennessee Titans and Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Steckel was born in Whitehall, Pennsylvania and attended the University of Kansas, where he was a Golden Gloves boxing champion and graduated in 1968 with a triple degree in social work, human relations and political science. He volunteered on the Robert F. Kennedy presidential campaign that year.
He then enlisted in the Marines and served in Vietnam as an infantry officer. He recently retired from USMC Reserves after thirty years of service with the rank of Colonel.
After his return from Vietnam in 1970, Steckel was stationed in Quantico, Va., where he played football for the Quantico Marine football team until 1971. He Joined the USMC Reserves in 1972. He then worked as an assistant football coach at the University of Colorado from 1973 to 1976. He was an assistant at Navy in 1977, then an assistant with the San Francisco 49ers in 1978.
Steckel joined the Minnesota Vikings coaching staff as the receivers coach in 1979 and remained an assistant coach through the 1983 season. He was promoted to head coach of the Vikings for the 1984 season after longtime coach Bud Grant retired. Not surprisingly for a coach with a military background, Steckel emphasized discipline. It proved to be too much of a good thing, and he was fired after one season, in which the team posted a 3-13 record. He was succeeded by Grant—who briefly came out of retirement to fill the post.
He later worked as an assistant coach or coordinator with the New England Patriots from 1985 to 1988, then with Brown University in 1989, followed by another two years at the University of Colorado from 1991 to 1992, then two years with the Denver Broncos from 1993 to 1994, followed by five years with the Houston Oilers and the Tennessee Titans, then a year with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers (2000) and a year with the Buffalo Bills (2003). He became President of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes on March 1, 2005 after taking time off to coach his son's high school team, which won the Tennessee state championship during his one year coaching at the high school. He is married to the former Chris Picket and they have three children - Lesley, a recent graduate of Baylor University, Luke, who currently plays football at Princeton University, and Christian, also a Baylor graduate,is head anchor for abc sports in Jackson Mississippi, and works college basketball games for ESPNU.
 JERRY BURNS
1986-1991 (52-43-0)
Jerry Burns played quarterback at the University of Michigan from 1947-1950. Michigan won four consecutive Big Ten titles when Burns was with the Wolverines. He graduated in February 1951 with a physical education degree.
Burns then began his coaching career. He served as the head baseball coach and assistant football coach with the University of Hawaii in 1951. Burns left Hawaii to coach at Whittier College in 1952, where he was the head basketball coach and an assistant football coach. At the beginning of 1953, he left Whittier and took a job as head football and head basketball coach at St. Mary Redford High School in Detroit, Michigan. Following the 1953 football season at St. Mary, Burns was hired by fellow Michigan alumnus Forest Evashevski as an assistant coach at the University of Iowa.
When Lombardi retired after the 1967 season, Jerry Burns was hired by Coach Bud Grant of the Minnesota Vikings. Grant hired Burns to be his offensive coordinator. Burns served as Minnesota's offensive coordinator for the next 18 years, from 1968-1985. During that time, the Vikings made the playoffs 12 times, won 11 division titles, and played in four Super Bowls.
When Grant retired from coaching in 1985, Burns was named as the fourth coach in the history of the Minnesota Vikings on January 7, 1986. He coached Minnesota for six years, from 1986 to 1991. Burns compiled a record of 52-43 and led the Vikings to the playoffs three times. He helped the Vikings win the division title in 1989 and led them to the NFC championship game in 1987. He announced his retirement as head coach on December 3, 1991.
Burns retired from coaching after the 1991 NFL season. Jerry Burns has in recent years been nominated for the Pro Football Hall of Fame, though he has yet to gain the votes necessary for induction. In 1998, Burns gave the Hall of Fame induction speech for Paul Krause, the defensive back he coached both at Iowa and with the Vikings. ![]()  DENNIS GREEN
1992-2001 (97-62-0)Dennis "Denny" Green (b. February 17, 1949 in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania) is a former American football head coach. During his professional career, Green coached the Arizona Cardinals and Minnesota Vikings.
Green's best season in Minnesota was in 1998, when the Vikings finished 15-1. However, they lost in the NFC Championship Game both that year and 2000. Despite compiling a record of 97-62 in the regular season, Green was unable to reach the Super Bowl.
Green was a disciple of Bill Walsh's West Coast offense and was touted by Walsh and other NFL pundits as a likely candidate to be the next African-American head coach in the NFL. Walsh also had his eye on the job at Stanford after a stint in the broadcast booth. On January 10, 1992, Green was named head coach of the Minnesota Vikings, replacing the retiring Jerry Burns.
In 2001, Denny's final season was marked by problems such as the death of Korey Stringer at training camp, the retirement of running back Robert Smith and star receiver Randy Moss reporting that "he plays when he wants to." The Vikings bought out Dennis Green's contract on January 4, 2002.
 MIKE TICE
2001-2005 (32-33-0)
Michael Peter Tice (born February 2, 1959 in Bayshore, New York) is an American football NFL coach, best known as the former head coach of the Minnesota Vikings. He is currently an assistant coach for the Jacksonville Jaguars.
Tice took over head coaching duties on an interim basis for the final game of the 2001 season, replacing Dennis Green, and then was officially named head coach on January 10, 2002. He became the sixth head coach in team history and the first former Viking player to assume the role.
Tice attended the University of Maryland, College Park where he played quarterback. He played tight end in the National Football League from 1981 to 1995 with the Seattle Seahawks, Washington Redskins and Minnesota Vikings. He was the offensive line coach for the Vikings prior to becoming the head coach. In March 2005, the NFL began to investigate Tice for organizing and profiting from a Super Bowl ticket scalping operation within the Vikings organization. He later admitted that these charges were true and the NFL fined him $100,000 on June 30, 2005.
During his tenure of more than four years as the Vikings head coach, he had a regular season record of 32-33-0, while going 1-1 in the playoffs.  BRAD CHILDRESS
2006- present (6-10)
Brad Childress (born June 27, 1956 in Aurora, Illinois, USA) is a professional American football coach. Attended High School at Marmion Academy. Prior to being selected as the head coach of the Minnesota Vikings beginning with the 2006 season, Childress worked as an assistant coach for various college organizations and NFL franchises, most recently with the Philadelphia Eagles.
On January 6, 2006, Childress was hired to be the head coach of the Minnesota Vikings. This choice was the result of a fervent and short-lived selection process. Former coach Mike Tice was informed that his contract would not be renewed shortly after the Vikings' last game of the 2005 season on December 31, and rumors began to circulate about Childress as the new head coach on January 5. Four candidates were interviewed by the Vikings: Kansas City Chiefs offensive coordinator Al Saunders, Indianapolis Colts assistant head coach Jim Caldwell, and former Vikings defensive coordinator Ted Cottrell.
During Childress' first year as head coach of the Vikings, the offense averaged around one touchdown per game, a significant decline from the Dennis Green and Mike Tice years. Although the Vikings had finished with a winning record the previous year and had significant salary cap space, the Vikings finished the year at a meager 6-10 under Childress.
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