I can remember him as if it were only yesterday. The piercing blue eyes, the unwavering expression, and the shear aura of confidence. I was just a young impressionable kid. It was my first year watching professional football, and I was in love with the game instantly. There were "purple people eaters" and this lunatic quarterback named Joe Kapp running as if he were a fullback. But always on the sideline was Head Coach Bud Grant.

The images are frozen in my mind as if I were up there in the freezing stands of the old Metropolitan Stadium in downtown Minneapolis. It was Bud Grant led the Vikings as if he were a 20th Century Viking at the helm of a 100 yard frozen green tundra. The epitome of class, if you look up leadership in the dictionary, you will find his name. Under Grant's leadership, the Minnesota Vikings won four National Football Conference Championships. Though attendance in four Super Bowl's never produced the coveted National Football League Championship, Grants' Vikings were the classiest act in the NFL. Grant followed the adage that defense wins championships and produced a defense that became feared around the NFL. Alan Page, Jim Marshall, Carl Eller and Gary Larsen played defensive line the way it was designed to be played. In an era where there weren't 20 coaches on the sideline, Bud Grant was the leader of only a handful of Vikings coaches. In 1969, those four players ALL went to the Pro Bowl.

Bud Grant was also known to lead by example. An avid outdoors-man, Grant was noted for making his team stand in the freezing Minnesota winter on the sideline without heaters. It was not uncommon to see these games played in temperatures well below zero. Yet there was Bud Grant in his Viking cap, sometimes even wearing a goose-down jacket. Never complaining, leading his team. Leading men that would have followed him into battle.

It's is these vivid memories I have of Bud Grant, on that frozen sideline, his breath visible as he exhaled in the freezing Minnesota afternoon that I will always remember. Not just the best Vikings Coach of all time, but one of the most respected professionals the game ever produced. We could sure lead a few more like him today.

Learn more about this author, Michael Gregory.
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