Legendary Chicago Bears coach Mike Ditka, who led the team to its only Super Bowl victory in 1986, has died, his family announced. He was 86 years old. “It is with deep sadness that we announce the passing of our beloved husband, father, grandfather and friend, Mike Ditka,” the family said in a statement Friday that did not include a cause of death. “While the world knew Mike as a Hall of Fame football player, a legendary coach and leader of the Chicago Bears’ Super Bowl XX championship team, we knew him as the heart of our family,” the statement said. “Mike will be missed beyond measure and forever remembered.” The Bears released a statement saying Ditka’s impact on the team as “a player, coach and proud icon and ambassador of our organization is immeasurable.” Ditka, the statement said, “created a lifetime of cherished memories in the hearts and minds of Bears fans that will last for generations.” Ditka, who was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1988, was remembered by the organization. president Jim Porter as a player who “brought an unparalleled level of toughness to an era already defined by physicality.” “He brought that same philosophy to his training,” Porter said in a statement. Tough and pugnacious, Ditka epitomized the hard-hitting team he led to a 46-10 rout of the New England Patriots in Super Bowl XX and was called “Iron Mike,” both for his gruff demeanor and because he came from a steel town in western Pennsylvania. Ditka and defensive coordinator Buddy Ryan are carried down the field after they defeated New England 46-10 to win Super Bowl XX in 1986. Chicago Tribune/TNS via Getty Ditka, who was born Michael Dyczko on Oct. 18, 1939, became a beloved figure in the Windy City and the embodiment of Chicago’s tough-guy, blue-collar identity. In the years after the Bears won the Super Bowl, Ditka was immortalized by “Saturday Night Live” in the “Bill Swerski’s Superfans” sketches, which featured a group of fans singing his praises to the point of absurdity in Chicawgo accents. “If I may change the subject for a moment, gentlemen, Coach Ditka vs. The Hurricane, who would win?” says Bill Swerski’s character in a parody. “Ditka! Ditka!” the others respond. Ditka was married from 1961 to 1973 to his first wife, Marge. That marriage produced four children: Mark, Matt, Mike and Megan. In 1977 he married Diane Trantham, who also survives him. The Ditka family has not yet announced any funeral arrangements. Ditka, the eldest of four brothers, was the son of a welder of Polish and Ukrainian origin who changed his name to make it easier to pronounce. But growing up in the city of Aliquippa, Ditka excelled in the American sport of soccer and that earned him a scholarship and an out-of-town ticket to the University of Pittsburgh, where he initially planned to study dentistry. Instead, Ditka excelled on the field and in 1961 was drafted by the Bears as a tight end. There, Ditka redefined a position that primarily consisted of blocking running backs by becoming a scoring machine who racked up a dozen touchdowns in his first season and was named Rookie of the Year. Mike Ditka when he was an All-American tight end with the University of Pittsburgh in 1960. APDitka was a star on the Bears’ 1963 championship run in the pre-Super Bowl era and a Pro Bowler in each of the five seasons he played for “Da Osos.” He also gained some infamy by criticizing a fan who ran onto the field in the middle of a championship game broadcast on national television. “Ditka has been trained since high school to knock down anything that moves,” famous Chicago newspaper columnist Mike Royko wrote in September 1966. “The young man went airborne. He was limp when he landed and shaky when the police took him away.” Oilers in 1967 for the then princely sum of $300,000. Unfortunately, Ditka said disparagingly, “he was throwing away nickels like manhole covers.” Ditka went on to play for the Dallas Cowboys, where in 1972 he caught a touchdown pass in their 24-3 victory over the Miami Dolphins in Super Bowl VI. Focus On Sport / GettyAfter retiring in 1973, Ditka was hired by the Cowboys. as assistant coach. And during his nine seasons there, Dallas made the playoffs eight times, won six division titles, three NFC championships and a Super Bowl victory in 1977. “Ditka was the first enshrined man in Canton to win Super Bowls as a player, assistant coach and head coach,” the Hall of Fame said in a statement. In 1982, Ditka and Halas made peace and the former Bears tight end became the Bears’ head coach. With his bushy mustache, slicked-back hair and growling voice, Ditka actually looked a bit like the bear in the team logo, Chicago sportswriters noted. “Give me three years and if you walk with me, we’ll make it to the dance,” Ditka reportedly promised at a team meeting. It took Ditka four years to lead the team to the Super Bowl. And he did it with a tough, old-school style of play that relied more on running than passing, a hard-hitting defense, and what he called “Bears Football.” Powered by one of the most formidable defenses ever fielded by an NFL team and an offense led by unstoppable running back Walter Payton and fearless quarterback Jim McMahon, the Bears quickly defeated the Patriots in the championship game. “There are teams that are blonde and others that are not so blonde,” Ditka said at the time. “Some teams are called Smith, others Grabowski. We are Grabowskis!” They were boastful Grabowskis. The Bears were so confident they would win it all that the team recorded a championship anthem called the “Super Bowl Shuffle” seven weeks before the Super Bowl. Under Ditka, the Bears won several more division titles and played in seven playoff games. But Ditka never led the team back to the big dance. Ditka suffered a heart attack during the 1988 season, but the Bears continued to mostly win. Five years later, after the Bears won just five games and lost 11 during the 1992 season, Halas fired Ditka. He then became a television football analyst and then coached the New Orleans Saints for three losing seasons before being fired from that job in 1999. But Ditka never coached another NFL team again. Instead, Ditka returned to the broadcast booth, working for NBC, CBS and ESPN and opening a chain of steakhouses. Never one to shy away from the camera, Ditka co-starred in the 2005 comedy “Kicking & Screaming” alongside Will Ferrell and Robert Duvall, playing an exaggerated version of himself in the film. Ditka also made numerous cameos in various television shows. And he embarked on a three-decade career as a ubiquitous television host of everything from Hanes underwear and erectile dysfunction drugs to Campbell’s Chunky soups. In 2004, Ditka seriously considered running as a Republican for a vacant US Senate seat in Illinois. He refused and that seat was won by future President Barack Obama. Ditka, however, was highly critical of Obama’s presidency and considered himself an “ultraconservative.” But Ditka visited the White House in 2011 with members of the Super Bowl-winning Bears team, where he presented the president with a Bears jersey with the number 85 and “Obama” emblazoned on the back. Traditionally, the Super Bowl winning team visits the White House after the game, but in 1986 their scheduled visit was canceled due to the Challenger space shuttle disaster. “When I arrived in Chicago in the summer of 1985, Mike Ditka and the Chicago Bears were king,” Obama posted on And he sparked backlash in 2017 when, during a radio interview, he criticized black players for kneeling during the singing of the National Anthem and said he was unaware of any racial oppression in the U.S. The next day, Ditka apologized. “I have absolutely seen oppression in society over the last 100 years,” Ditka said in a statement to WGN-TV in Chicago. “The interview was about the NFL and related topics. That’s where my head was at.” In 2024, after several years of living in Florida, Ditka returned to Chicago. “Chicago is my home,” he said.
