Sports

Mike Ditka, the Legendary Former Chicago Bears Coach Who Led Team to a Super Bowl Win, Dies at 86

CHICAGO (AP) — Mike Ditka, who won NFL titles as a player and coach with the Chicago Bears, has died. He was 86.

Ditka’s family announced the death on Friday in a statement.

“It is with profound sadness that we announce the passing of our beloved husband, father, grandfather, and friend, Mike Ditka,” The family said. “While the world knew Mike as a Hall of Fame football player, legendary coach, and leader of the Chicago Bears’ Super Bowl XX championship team, we knew him as the heart of our family. Mike will be missed beyond measure and remembered forever.”

The Chicago Bears on Friday said they join Ditka’s family and all Bears fans in “deep sadness and reverence.”

“Mike’s impact on the Chicago Bears organization, over decades as a player, coach, and proud icon and ambassador for our organization, is immeasurable,” the team said in a statement. “His integral role in bringing world championships to our city and our franchise, both as a player and as our coach, established prominence and excellence at a world-class level, but also created a lifetime of cherished memories in the hearts and minds of Bears fans that will last for generations.”

Nicknamed “Iron Mike” as a player, Ditka helped revolutionize the tight-end position, then moved to the sidelines and took over as Chicago’s coach. His 1985 team featured one of the game’s most dominant defenses ever. It also had enough outsized personalities to record a rap video, “The Super Bowl Shuffle,” and back up their boasting in the championship game three months later.

After retiring as a coach, Ditka became a restaurateur, pitchman and TV personality, as well as a forceful advocate for improved medical and retirement benefits for former players.

Ditka was tough and gruff, the quintessential Chicago Bear. He did everything from order off the menu to knock defensive backs on their butts with a growl. His adopted hometown reveled in every minute.

Still revered as “Da Coach” and ringmaster of the 1985 Bears, one of the most dominant and perhaps the zaniest Super Bowl-winning team in league history. Ditka was enshrined in the College and Pro Football Halls of Fame and the Bears said during a ceremony in 2013 that his “No. 89” jersey will be the last one retired by the team.

FILE - In this Jan. 26, 1986, file photo, Chicago Bears coach Mike Ditka is carried off the field by Steve McMichael, left, and William Perry after the Bears defeated the New England Patriots 46-10 in NFL football's Super Bowl XX in New Orleans. Willie Gault (83) and Maury Buford (8) join the celebration. (AP Photo / Phil Sandlin, File)

He was born in Carnegie, Pennsylvania, the son of a welder who changed the family name from Dyczko. He grew up in nearby Aliquippa, close to the coal-mining and steel-manufacturing plants that dotted the western part of the state, a big, talented, three-sport athlete and All-American at Pitt whose bruising style made his first nickname, “Iron Mike,” a good fit.

Selected fifth overall by flinty Chicago owner George Halas in the 1961 draft, Ditka went on to Rookie of the Year honors, multiple Pro Bowl trips and the 1963 NFL Championship. In the bargain, he and Baltimore’s John Mackey changed the tight end position and offensive schemes forever. He was a battering ram of a blocker, but Ditka was just as likely to catch a short pass and pinball through an entire secondary or outrace a lone safety on a deep touchdown throw.

He left Chicago in 1966, playing briefly for Philadelphia and Dallas. He moved to the sideline in 1973 as an assistant to the revered Tom Landry and stayed with the Cowboys for eight seasons, before returning to a hero’s welcome in Chicago as head coach in 1982.

Ditka’s return to the Bears lasted 10 tumultuous years, including five straight NFC Central titles, the Super Bowl win, a DUI conviction, a heart attack, a long-running feud with defensive coordinator Buddy Ryan and, finally, a new nickname — “Da Coach.”

To Hall of Fame linebacker Mike Singletary, the seeds of what was to come were planted in Ditka’s first meeting with the team. He laid out his vision, saying Chicago would be in the Super Bowl in three years — and many of the players in the room would not be around for it.

“When I first heard him when he walked in the room, to me Coach Ditka had the opportunity to be the greatest coach of all time because he had the fire,” Singletary said at the Bears’ 100th anniversary celebration in June 2019. “I don’t know George Halas coached. But I can imagine that the fire and intensity and passion that Coach Ditka exuded that first day set the tone for exactly what he said: ’Three years from now, we’re going to be in the Super Bowl.’ And that was 1982. In ’85, we were there and it was because of that vision.”

The public beefs with Ryan mirrored the behind-the-scenes battles that Ditka waged trying to contain a team bristling with outsized personalities.

“It was more than a team,” Ditka once said. “It was a team of characters that had character that played for a crazy man, who let him be crazy and had fun doing it and don’t apologize for it ever. I wouldn’t want to be one of these suits walking around on the sideline today.

“I have no desire to be that. I was what I was and they were what they were and, damn, it was fun.”

It wasn’t until two dozen players recorded “The Super Bowl Shuffle” — an audacious rap-styled video released three months ahead of the 1986 title game — that the rest of the football world wondered whether Ditka was losing his grip.

His players never did.

“We call him ’Sybil’ after that girl in the movie,” quarterback Jim McMahon once explained. “You know, the one that had all those personalities. Mike will be calm one minute, then throw a clipboard the next. People don’t understand that, but we do.”

The Bears demolished the New England Patriots 46-10 in the Super Bowl, but Ditka often said he regretted having McMahon and defensive tackle William “The Refrigerator” Perry run for touchdowns instead of Walter Payton, Chicago’s loyal and long-suffering running back.

Ryan departed for a head coaching job in Philadelphia soon after. While the Bears continued to be a contender for most of the next five years, a 5-11 season prompted Ditka’s departure in 1992.

FILE - Former Chicago Bears player and football coach Mike Ditka waits for the halftime ceremony where his No. 89 was to be retired by the Bears during an NFL football game between the Bears and the Dallas Cowboys, Monday, Dec. 9, 2013, in Chicago. (AP Photo / Nam Y. Huh, File)

After a five-year absence, he returned to coaching with the New Orleans Saints, but failed to revive the franchise. After a miserable 1999 season ended with a 3-13 record — Ditka’s worst as either a player or coach — he left the sidelines for good.

His face and demeanor were so familiar by then that a second act became an easy segue. Ditka began building a stable of restaurants and appeared as himself in TV sitcoms from “Cheers” to “Third Rock from the Sun,” as well as shows such as “L.A. Law” and “Saturday Night Live.”

He also stayed close to the game as an NFL analyst and game-day show personality at ESPN. Ditka’s high-profile status also made him an effective advocate to secure improved health and retirement benefits for former players.

His name also circulated for years in Illinois political circles. Though he never ran for office, Ditka described himself as a staunch conservative and was mentioned several times as a possible Republican candidate, including a congressional race against then state Rep. Barack Obama for the U.S. Senate.

Reaction From Those Who Knew Da Coach

Ditka’s passing prompted an outpouring of support from Bears fans and players, politicians and beyond.

“Da Coach was not only an icon in Chicago, but the entire football world,” Gov. JB Pritzker wrote in a social media post Friday. “Our thoughts are with Mike Ditka’s family, friends, and Bears fans today. May his memory be a blessing.”

“Da Coach. Hall of Famer. The heartbeat of the ’85 Bears and a Super Bowl champion,” Jarrett Payton, a longtime Chicago journalist whose father Walter starred with the Bears under Ditka in the 1980s. “Chicago won’t be the same.”

Current Chicago Bears Head Coach Ben Johnson expressed admiration for his predecessor. 

“As far as I’m concerned, Coach Ditka’s the gold standard in terms of this place,” Johnson said. “He’s a legend around here as a player, as a coach, his impact is still being felt to this day. As the head coach of the Bears, I feel humbled to be in that same chair that he was once in. It’s a sad day .. he’s in our thoughts and prayers.”

James “Big Cat” Williams, an offensive lineman for the Bears from 1991-2002, said Ditka gave him his start.

“He was the first coach that I ever had that knew who to yell at, who not to yell at, who it was going to help, who it wasn’t going to help,” Williams said. “… I came from a small Black college, so coming to the Bears was a culture shock to me in general, but having the opportunity to play under someone that had played the game before, knew the ins and outs of it, knew what it meant to be a Chicago Bear — I took a lot of the things he said to heart because he was speaking from a place of genuineness.”

When Ditka was enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1988, he became both the first tight end ever voted in as well as the first person who had won Super Bowls as a player, assistant coach and head coach.

“‘Iron Mike’ brought an unrivaled level of toughness to an era already defined by physicality,” Jim Porter, president & CEO of the Hall of Fame, said in a statement, “but he also was much more gifted as a pass catcher than many realized and became the ideal player for Coach George Halas to reimagine the tight end position. Mike brought competitiveness and a hard-nosed play style as he developed into both a fantastic blocker and someone who could punish would-be tacklers on his receptions.

After retiring from football, Ditka served as an on-air analyst with ESPN for more than a decade, appearing regularly on “Sunday NFL Countdown” and occasionally on Monday Night Football.

“I am heartbroken to learn of the passing of Mike Ditka,” ESPN anchor Mike Greenberg said in a statement on social media. “There is no figure in my career or my life who looms larger, he was truly larger than life and that will never change. Rest in peace Iron Mike, thank you for absolutely everything.”

Matt Masterson and Jessica Watts contributed. This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

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