Mike Ditka, who died Friday, once issued a playful warning to Chiefs' Andy Reid

Pete Grathoff, The Kansas City Star on Oct 9, 2026

Published in Football

By clicking submit, I authorize Arcamax and its affiliates to: (1) use, sell, and share my information for marketing purposes, including cross-context behavioral advertising, as described in our Privacy Policy , (2) add to information that I provide with other information like interests inferred from web page views, or data lawfully obtained from data brokers, such as past purchase or location data, or publicly available data, (3) contact me or enable others to contact me by email or other means with offers for different types of goods and services, and (4) retain my information while I am engaging with marketing messages that I receive and for a reasonable amount of time thereafter. I understand I can opt out at any time through an email that I receive, or by clicking here

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The 1985 Chicago Bears are remembered as one of the greatest teams in NFL history, as they steamrolled three opponents in the postseason on the way to an 18-1 record.

After throttling the New England Patriots, 46-10, in Super Bowl XX, the Bears held a huge parade in Chicago. A few weeks later, running back Walter Payton and linebacker Mike Singletary were honored in Kansas City at the 101 Awards.

“It just doesn’t seem like I’ve stopped since the Super Bowl,” Singletary told The Kansas City Star on Feb. 21, 1986, as he was about to be honored as NFC Defensive Player of the Year.

Payton was the NFC Offensive Player of the Year, while the Bears’ Mike Ditka was the NFC Coach of the Year — a Chicago sweep of the top awards. But Ditka couldn’t make it to KC that day, so his wife Diana accepted his honor, The Star said at the time.

Ditka, who died Friday at the age of 86, was the NFC Coach of the Year again three seasons later. Newspapers from 1989 don’t show Ditka taking part in the 101 Awards ceremony that year, but he was in Kansas City in 2014 ... as a presenter.

In that role, Ditka issued a playful warning to Andy Reid — who had just finished his first season as the Chiefs’ head coach.

Reid had guided the Chiefs to an 11-5 record and playoff appearance one year after they won just two games. Ditka, meanwhile, was one of the most famous coaches of his era because of the success his teams had on the field, as well as his blunt talk.

So that year, in 2014, he was presenting the 101’s NFC Coach of the Year award to the Carolina Panthers’ Ron Rivera, as The Star reported that night. And that’s when Ditka turned to Reid and said: “Andy, I want to tell you one thing: They gave me this award one year, and they tried to take it away three years later.”

That drew big laughs from the crowd.

Chiefs chairman Clark Hunt chimed in: “Andy, I will tell you, we will not take back the award in three years. You have my word on that.”

More Ditka-Reid connections

Ditka, who had a 106-62 record as the Bears’ coach from 1982-92, guided Chicago to the postseason seven times. He later coached the Saints, but New Orleans won just 12 games in three seasons.

What Ditka is best known for as Saints coach was trading his entire draft class in 1999 to move from 12th to fifth in the first round of the NFL draft. Ditka gave up the Saints’ first, third, fourth, fifth, sixth and seventh picks in 1999, plus a first and third in 2000 — all to get Texas Longhorns running back Ricky Williams with the fifth pick, which was held by Washington.

At his first NFL combine with the Chiefs, Reid revealed that Ditka had contacted the Eagles about making that trade when Reid was Philly’s coach. Philadelphia had the second overall pick and Reid wanted quarterback Donovan McNabb.

“Coach Ditka, yeah that was a pretty big offer,” Reid said at the 2013 combine, per the Chiefs’ website. “We looked at all of those; we looked at all the offers. We felt that that pick was an important pick and we had an opportunity to pick up Donovan there and it worked out pretty good for us. But we did — we looked at all the different options and kind of weighed them out.”

Ditka later worked for ESPN as a football analyst, and he had some choice words for Reid in 2008 when McNabb was benched in Philly. Replacing McNabb wasn’t the issue for Ditka.

It was that quarterbacks coach Pat Shurmur told McNabb of the move.

“I don’t let the ballboy tell him,” Ditka said, per the Philadelphia Inquirer. “I don’t let the quarterback coach, the defensive coordinator tell him. I tell him. Not only do I tell him that he’s benched, I tell him why he’s benched.”