New Vikings edge rusher Jonathan Greenard perfectly cast as a leader of a ‘selfless’ defense

Jonathan Greenard, the Vikings edge rusher who signed for $19 million annually in March, is cast perfectly as the highest-paid player on a defense that identifies as selfless and will probably win more football games than popularity contests.

Just ask Ryan Tomberlin or his mother, Stacey.

They’ve known Greenard since he walked into their lives on a high school football field in Hiram, Ga., a suburb of Atlanta. Greenard was preparing for his junior season when the football program brought in Ryan as a new student manager.

Ryan is autistic and has epilepsy, which led him to Hiram’s vocational program for students with special needs. He wanted to be around the football team, and the star pass rusher welcomed him with open arms.

“Ryan was kind of overwhelmed,” Stacey Tomberlin said. “Saying hi to guys passing and they were eyeing him like, ‘Who’s this kid?’ Then Jonathan walked over and said, ‘Hey man, my name’s Jon. What’s your name?’”

That’s how a brotherhood began between Greenard, a 27-year-old NFL veteran, and Tomberlin, 29, who gave the pep talks to the football team before games. This summer, a decade after they met and fresh off Greenard’s career-high 12½ sacks for the Houston Texans, Greenard and Stacey teamed up to surprise Ryan by reuniting them at a local restaurant.

“I think Ryan keeps him grounded in a way,” Stacey Tomberlin said. “I just told Jon to go out there and do it for all the kids like Ryan who can’t. And boy does he.”

Greenard brought his many talents to Minnesota, quickly endearing himself with his boisterous personality and disruptive play. Younger teammates jokingly call him “unc,” or uncle, because he’s got stories that go farther back than his five NFL seasons. As the Tomberlins will tell you, Greenard has long been mature beyond his years.

“That’s my brother,” Greenard said of Ryan Tomberlin. “My relationship with him also puts things in perspective. You don’t always have it the worst. Some people would love to be in my shoes and do what I can do, so days where I’m feeling tired or sore, I just think back to people like him, my daughter [Rayna], my wife [Alta].”

Greenard also thinks back to his mother, Carmen Greenard-Varnum, who at one point raised three children – Victoria, Mack and Jonathan – through a second, nightly shift at work. He thinks back to his father, Mack Greenard Jr., who nurtured his football passion but was an alcoholic who passed away from congestive heart failure in 2014. He thinks back to his stepfather, Washington Varnum Jr., who helped raise him through that heartache before he died in 2021 to COVID-19.

One memory from the breakfast table sticks with Greenard.

“Lights barely being on at times,” he told the Minnesota Star Tribune. “Man, it was tough. Everybody has stories, but we got some stories. We had it better than others, but it wasn’t sweet. We had to work our tails off – [Carmen] had to work her tail off. The Carnation milk story: the three of us were splitting cereal off Carnation [evaporated] milk.”

“That’s why I keep going,” Greenard said. “We’re never going to be in that situation again where we have to share anything.”

Greenard-Varnum knew Jonathan, her youngest child, was going to be an athlete when he was a toddler chasing for Easter eggs. He was so much faster than everyone else, which was also the case when she put both of her sons into youth football. Greenard set his sights on an NFL career when he put on a helmet at 5 years old.

“His first year in Pop Warner, Jonathan scored 35 touchdowns,” Greenard-Varnum said. “I was on that field, I kid you not, I have video, I ran out of my shoes running up and down the field yelling, ‘Go! Go!’”

Greenard starred at running back and middle linebacker until his sophomore year of high school, when he hit a growth spurt, and coaches moved him to tight end and defensive end. He loved the game and studied it. His mom or sister held a camcorder during games, and his father reviewed the film with him afterward.

But Greenard had another talent.

“What’s crazy is the guy has a beautiful voice,” said Adrian Steele, a former assistant coach at Hiram High School. “He can sing like an angel.”

Greenard grew up singing Gospel music in the church choir with his sister and mother, the choir director. He wowed classmates at school talent shows. When he was 14, he was invited to a singing competition called “The Gift,” sponsored by McDonald’s for young singers in the Atlanta region. He placed fourth in a tryout and got invited to the final. Greenard-Varnum hired a vocal coach for him, and he earned enough recognition that she got calls from producers.

“I was talked about being on Tyler Perry films or stuff like that, like acting,” Greenard said. “But that was too much.”

He dedicated himself to football, becoming one of the best high school players in Georgia. He was named 5A Defensive Player of the Year as a senior, when he had seven sacks and an interception in 10 games.

Steele said Greenard was “a lightning rod of positivity.”

“Kids looked up to him and were drawn to him because of his natural leadership,” Steele added. “Everybody liked him. Teachers loved him because he was the guy that always had a big smile on his face and a great attitude.”

The son of then-Louisville defensive coordinator Todd Grantham was the first to see Greenard’s highlights online. He alerted his dad, who soon flew to Georgia to watch this long-limbed pass rusher who was blowing up offenses. Grantham’s urgency stunned Greenard.

His mother recalled that he called him and said, “‘Mom, as we were coming out the parking lot, this car blocked us in.” And he said he didn’t know what to do. It was Todd Grantham.”

Grantham’s pursuit was the embrace Greenard sought. He wanted to prove himself in the SEC and had talked with Kentucky’s coaching staff about a scholarship. He was invited to the Wildcats’ football camp in 2014 when he expected to commit. The Greenard family pulled together money for the roughly six-hour drive to Lexington. Yet upon arriving, they were told to wait a few days because coaches wanted to scout other defenders.

Stunned, the Greenards had money wired to them so they could get to Louisville for a tryout. The Cardinals offered Jonathan a scholarship on the spot.

“We sacrificed so much,” Greenard-Varnum said. “Robbing Peter to pay Paul: gas, driving, flying, all that stuff. But it has paid off.”

Greenard’s four years at Louisville ended because of a wrist injury in 2018. He added to his course load, graduated early and followed Grantham, who became the Florida defensive coordinator, to the SEC in 2019.

As Greenard built his NFL draft stock, he stomped on Kentucky with 3½ tackles for losses and two sacks in his last two games against the Wildcats.

“Boy, they paid for it,” Steele said. “Because every time he played them, whether it was at Louisville or Florida, he made sure they remembered it.”

Greenard, a 2020 third-round pick by the Texans, has been looking forward to Sunday’s game against his former team. He insists there’s no ill will toward the organization. But he entered the NFL at a tumultuous time for the globe during the COVID-19 pandemic and for the Texans, who had four head coaches during Greenard’s four seasons: Romeo Crennel, David Culley, Lovie Smith and DeMeco Ryans.

The Vikings have a quartet of former Texans defenders in Greenard, cornerback Shaq Griffin, and inside linebackers Blake Cashman and Kamu Grugier-Hill, who played in Houston in 2021 and 2022.

“It was a rough time over there,” Grugier-Hill said. “They had some success after I left, so I was jealous of that. But it made us closer, made the locker room closer.”

Despite Greenard’s career-high 12½ sacks in a career-best 15 games last season, the Texans let him play out his rookie contract and walk in free agency. Houston instead signed former Vikings pass rusher Danielle Hunter, paying him nearly $25 million per year compared to Greenard’s $19 million in Minnesota.

It wasn’t easy for Greenard to uproot his young family from Houston, where their daughter was born in September 2023.

But like Grantham at Louisville, the Vikings were waiting with open arms.

“Being here is a breath of fresh air,” said Greenard, who signed a four-year, $76 million deal in March.

“I can always tell a lot about a team just based off the head coach,” he added. “Whether he’s a guy who’s genuine or just says the right things. I talked to former players who had nothing but great things to say about [Kevin O’Connell].”

An initial phone call with O’Connell confirmed Greenard’s research. He was then blown away by a dinner invitation. Vikings team brass, including General Manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah, O’Connell, defensive coordinator Brian Flores and other coaches, wanted to host Greenard, Cashman, and edge rusher Andrew Van Ginkel — the team’s big free-agent signings — for a night together with everyone’s families.

“They understood that they can’t expect you to have great results without a great relationship,” Greenard said. “I think that was one of the main things that I respected a lot. Being from another place where I went through a lot of different coaches, understanding that this was the norm – that kind of shocked me a little bit.”

The Vikings defense has shown power in connection, thriving early with six new key contributors: Greenard, Cashman, Van Ginkel, defensive tackle Jerry Tillery and cornerbacks Stephon Gilmore and Griffin.

Greenard’s voice can often be the loudest in that group. But he doesn’t mind sharing the spotlight.

“We got a lot of guys that are obviously proving themselves and want to be proven,” Greenard said. “But we want so much more than big contracts, this and that. We’re trying to win. We’re really trying to win a championship here. I think that overrides everything when it comes to being selfless, worrying about your job, doing it for that next person. Because when we win, we’re all going to benefit.”