I read this for a second thinking you were talking about the Godfather, and was like wtf are you talking about man. Anyway, since I commented, I would go out on a limb and say Christopher (at the time) would have been a contender for it. At that point in the show, Christopher had been getting groomed to take over after Tony. Obviously that plan fizzled out, but you gotta remember...Christopher was going to take this family into the 21st century.
"We're already in the 21st Century, T."
From a business standpoint, Vito was very level headed and knew how to make money. He didn't have enemies or cause tension among the families.
He would have made an excellent choice to take control of the family once Tony died if they never killed him for being gay. Christopher was better off running his own crew and thats it. I would have never promoted him higher than that and I think Tony Soprano would have agreed with that decision in the long run.
