Mike Ditka, the Hall of Fame tight end and head coach of the 1985 Chicago Bears championship team, has died at the age of 86, according to an announcement from his family on Friday.
Mike Ditka earned renown as one of football’s true titans through a career that spanned 12 NFL seasons as a player and decades more on the sidelines. Born in Carnegie, Pennsylvania, Ditka starred collegiately at Pittsburgh before the Chicago Bears selected him in the first round of the 1961 draft. He immediately emerged as a star, earning Pro Bowl selections in each of his first five seasons and first-team All-Pro honors in two of them. During his rookie year, he recorded 1,076 receiving yards, becoming the first tight end to eclipse 1,000 yards in a debut season, alongside a career-best 12 touchdowns. Across his playing career from 1961 to 1972, Ditka totaled 427 receptions, 5,812 yards, and 43 touchdowns while playing six seasons with the Chicago Bears, two with the Philadelphia Eagles, and four with the Dallas Cowboys. In his second-to-last season, he won a Super Bowl title as part of the Tom Landry-led Cowboys team that defeated Don Shula and the Miami Dolphins in Super Bowl VI.
Coaching the 1985 Chicago Bears to Super Bowl XX Glory
After his playing days, Ditka transitioned to coaching, serving as an assistant on the Dallas staff from 1973 to 1981 and winning Super Bowl XII as a wide receivers and special teams coach under Landry. The Chicago Bears hired him as head coach in 1982. Four seasons later, his squad achieved historic dominance. The 1985 Bears started the season 12-0 and finished 15-1, combining Ditka’s offense with Buddy Ryan’s defense. Featuring a roster of Hall of Famers including Walter Payton, Mike Singletary, Richard Dent, Dan Hampton, and Steve McMichael, the team shut out the New York Giants and the Los Angeles Rams in the NFC playoffs before routing the New England Patriots 46-10 in Super Bowl XX in New Orleans. The lasting image of Ditka in a striped Bears sweater being carried off the field by McMichael and William Perry cemented the team’s legendary status.
It was more than a team. 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.
Mike Ditka, Chicago Bears head coach
Pop-Culture Stardom and ‘Da Bears’ on Saturday Night Live
Ditka’s hard-nosed attitude, Midwestern sensibilities, and distinct accent transcended sports to make him a pop-culture icon. NBC’s Saturday Night Live
famously parodied him with its recurring Superfans
sketch, featuring cast members like regular guest George Wendt portraying exaggerated Chicago diehards wearing mustaches and channeling Ditka. The sketches coined the omnipresent phrase Da Bears
and became so popular that Ditka made a pair of cameo appearances on the program.
Hall of Fame Career and Later Roles in Football
Over 11 seasons coaching the Chicago Bears from 1982 to 1992 and three seasons with the New Orleans Saints from 1997 to 1999, Ditka compiled a 121-95 record as a head coach. He remains one of only two people to win a Super Bowl as a player, assistant coach, and head coach, alongside Tom Flores. Inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1988, Ditka later worked as an analyst for NBC and ESPN, appearing on Sunday Morning Countdown
from 2006 to 2015. Jim Porter, the Hall of Fame’s president and CEO, noted that Ditka brought an unrivaled level of toughness to an era already defined by physicality
while redefining the tight end position for coach George Halas.
