The Chicago Bears announced they would be retiring Mike Ditka’s number this season. This will be the 14th number they have retired. For this reason, they also announced they will no longer retire player numbers. This means great players like Mike Singletary and Brian Urlaker will not get their numbers retired, even though they played their entire Hall of Fame careers for the Bears. Just because a player makes the Hall of Fame does not necessarily mean their number should be retired, for instance, if the player played on several different teams. Deion Sanders is a sure Hall of Famer, but he played for five teams.
From early on the Bears were all about retiring player numbers, a practice that continued decade after decade. I appreciate the celebration of history that goes into the retiring of a number. Too bad the Bears have to put an end to it. The fourteen retired numbers:
03 Bronko Nagurski 1943
05 George McAfee 1950
07 George Halas 1983
28 Willie Gallimore 1963
34 Walter Payton 1987
40 Gale Sayers 1971
41 Brian Piccolo 1969
42 Sid Luckman 1950
51 Dick Butkus 1973
56 Bill Hewitt 1936
61 Bill George 1965
66 Bulldog Turner 1952
77 Red Grange 1934
89 Mike Ditka 1967
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