Editorial: The terrible burden of destiny: Ditka’s discipline, endearing pugnacity raised and reflected the spirit of Chicago

Among Chicago’s plentiful pantheon of celebrated artists, sports heroes, politicians and larger-than-life personalities, who has represented the big shoulders spirit that defines the city more authentically than Mike Ditka?

Family members announced Friday the death at age 86 of the outsize Bears coach who brought Chicago its only Super Bowl championship and was both lampooned and admired for a personality drawn straight out of the city’s character.

Ditka’s long football career is decorated with honors so well known to any Chicagoan that they hardly need to be recounted. Yet, they will be, here and across the nation as analysts, pundits and fans reflect on the legacy of one the most prominent names in NFL history.

As well they should be.

But beyond the gridirion, we are drawn today to Ditka’s uncanny likeness to that character in Carl Sandburg’s 1914 poem “Chicago” described as a fighter who carries “under his ribs the heart of the people.” And in that likeness we see Ditka’s reflection not just of what our city wants to be but what it is. Though born in small-town Pennsylvania, he grew to embody the rugged, determined spirit of one of the world’s great metropolises.

Flawed. Brutal. Sometimes sneered at. Yet, ever strong and fierce.

Yes, he was the passionate strategist who scolded his players in public and came to blows in the locker room with his defensive coordinator in the midst of a historic season. Yes, he became the hawker of countless products as his coaching fame grew. And, yes, he could be parodied for artless speech and a distinctly Chicago accent.

But he was also and always the beloved “Da Coach.” Teased in comedy sketches on late-night television, while still revered and respected. The candid panelist on Sunday afternoon football. The entrepreneur whose restaurants bearing his name, including a longtime Ditka’s at Arlington Park and another still in operation in Oakbrook Terrace, proudly celebrate Chicago's red-meat personality.

“Come and show me another city with lifted head singing so proud to be alive and coarse and strong and cunning,” wrote Sandburg. “Flinging magnetic curses amid the toil of piling job on job, here is a tall bold slugger set vivid against the little soft cities.”

Such, too, was Mike Ditka. One of only two men to have won Super Bowls as player, assistant coach and head coach. Hall of Famer in the college and pros. Astute television analyst. Pitchman for everything from light beer to insurance to antifreeze to fast food to underwear and toilet paper and erectile dysfunction products.

“Bareheaded, / Shoveling, / Wrecking, / Planning, / Building, breaking, rebuilding, / Under the smoke, dust all over his mouth, laughing with white teeth, / Under the terrible burden of destiny laughing as a young man laughs.”

Fired from the Bears following a dismal 5-11 season in 1992, Ditka left the Chicago franchise with characteristic pith. “This too shall pass,” he said, and perhaps it did in its way. But in another sense, the larger-than-life character that brought Ditka international respect, derision and fame shall not soon fade.

It defined the man. It defines a city. Show us another “with lifted head singing so proud to be alive and coarse and strong and cunning.”