MINNEAPOLIS -- Standing on the dais at U.S. Bank Stadium on Friday and surveying a $1.1 billion building that might not be there had another ownership group bought the Minnesota Vikings 11 years ago, Kevin Warren thought of Dennis Green.
Warren, the NFL's highest-ranking African-American business-side executive as the Vikings' chief operating officer, was away from the NFL in 2004, working for the law firm of Greenberg Traung, when he received a phone call from Green. The former Vikings coach, then three years removed from a 10-year run in Minnesota that was equal parts terrific and tumultuous, had heard Vikings owner Red McCombs might be looking to sell the team.