Hall of Famer Believes Mike Ditka Ruined Jim McMahon's Career

Jun 26, 2020

Many things have gone into the misery that is Chicago Bears quarterbacks after the past seven decades. For the briefest moment though in the 1980s, it looked like the team had something in Jim McMahon. While he had his personality quirks, there was no denying the guy had skills as a passer. Yet he never quite seemed to take off during his time with the team. Don Pierson is a Hall of Fame writer who worked with the Chicago Tribune for 40 years. He covered the teams of that era extensively and knew the problem wasn’t McMahon himself it was head coach Mike Ditka.

The Bears hired the longtime Dallas Cowboys assistant and former Hall of Fame tight end in 1982 to become their head coach. It was a bold choice at the time. Owner George Halas felt Ditka provided something the team needed, even if he did it without consulting GM Jim Finks.

It’s hard to argue that considering Ditka won the Super Bowl three years later. Pierson though thinks it came at a cost.

According to Pierson, Mike Ditka might have been many things but a great quarterbacks coach he was not. Bears fans might remember vividly Ditka routinely berating Harbaugh on the sidelines as well as in postgame dress-downs.
“McMahon knew more offense than anybody in the building. Coaching was a problem in that era, too,” Pierson said.

Mike Ditka felt quarterbacks were a necessary evil

It’s hardly a secret that Ditka hated quarterbacks in general. Keep this in mind. During his decade-long tenure in Chicago, the head coach started 13 different quarterbacks. This doesn’t count the multiple times he pulled some in favor of other backups too. Part of this had to do with injury setbacks, but also Ditka’s fickle nature. If a guy struggled or ran a play wrong he had no qualms about yanking them out of the game.

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If Ditka could’ve played games without quarterbacks, he would’ve. In his time has a head coach, the Bears finished in the top 5 in rushing attempts six times. They finished top 10 eight times. Any time McMahon had the audacity to change plays at the line of scrimmage, it led to confrontations on the sideline. Everybody felt the coach operated a modern offense with 1930s-style thinking.

It wasn’t fun being a quarterback in his offense. Could McMahon’s legacy had been different if he’d been under a more forward-thinking coach? Pierson thinks so.