{"id":922084,"date":"2026-10-09T17:26:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-09T17:26:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/922084\/"},"modified":"2026-10-09T17:26:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-09T17:26:12","slug":"nfl-legend-mike-ditka-dead-at-86","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/922084\/","title":{"rendered":"NFL Legend Mike Ditka Dead At 86"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mike Ditka
\n NFL Legend Dead At 86<\/p>\n

\n Published
\n October 9, 2026
\n 8:21 AM PDT
\n |
\n Updated
\n October 9, 2026
\n 8:58 AM PDT\n <\/p>\n

Mike Ditka<\/a> — one of the most legendary figures in NFL history — is dead.<\/p>\n

The Pro Football Hall of Famer’s family announced his death Friday, saying in a statement … “It is with profound sadness that we announce the passing of our beloved husband, father, grandfather, and friend, Mike Ditka.”<\/p>\n

The family continues … “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.”<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"1009-Mike-Ditka-Remembering-SUB-1\"<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

They add … “Mike will be missed beyond measure and remembered forever.”<\/p>\n

The cause of death is unclear.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Ditka battled health issues throughout his life, notably suffering a stroke in 2012 and a major heart attack in 2018.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"mike<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

He was an absolute legend on the gridiron — he played tight end at a Hall of Fame level from 1961 to 1972, and then he went on to have a brilliant career as an NFL head coach.<\/p>\n

Ditka famously led the 1985 Chicago Bears to a Super Bowl victory … and was later inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1988.<\/p>\n

Off the field, Ditka was just as iconic as he was on it. He starred in commercials — including a line of ads for the Viagra-like drug Levitra, and he was famously praised in a recurring “Saturday Night Live” sketch.<\/p>\n

In the bit, George Wendt, Chris Farley<\/a>, Mike Myers<\/a> and Robert Smigel sat at a bar table and spoke fondly of the coach and “Da Bears.” Mike even appeared in the sketch at one point.<\/p>\n

Ditka had four kids — three sons and one daughter.<\/p>\n

He was 86.<\/p>\n

RIP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mike Ditka NFL Legend Dead At 86 Published October 9, 2026 8:21 AM PDT | Updated October 9,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":922085,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[559],"tags":[64,63,44,593,85,635,26898],"class_list":["post-922084","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news","tag-nfl","tag-sports","tag-sports-news","tag-tmz-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/922084","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=922084"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/922084\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/922085"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=922084"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=922084"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=922084"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}