NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Kansas City Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker, who tends to be talkative on the subject of his Christian faith, briefly went silent on Monday night when he was asked, “What do you think about gays?”
“I understand that this is a great evening and we’re here to focus on the game,” Butker said while sitting at a lectern during the Super Bowl opening-night media event in the Superdome. “Maybe if I saw him without a camera, we’d have a great conversation.”
It has been an eventful year for the 29-year-old Butker, who joined the Chiefs in 2017 and has been part of seven consecutive AFC championship games and five trips to the Super Bowl. He is chasing his third straight ring and fourth overall.
The roller coaster began almost exactly a year ago, when the Chiefs met the 49ers in Las Vegas. One of the most accurate kickers in the NFL kept Kansas City in the Super Bowl with a trio of field goals, including a 57-yarder in the third quarter, before his 29-yarder at the end of regulation forced overtime. Kansas City went on to win, 25-22.
Then came the offseason, and Butker made a slew headlines off the field.
“There’s been a lot that’s gone on and I never expected to be this known, I guess, as a kicker,” Butker said.
Last May, Butker was asked to deliver a commencement address at Benedictine College, a private Catholic liberal arts school in Atchison, Kansas. Among his polarizing remarks, Butker postulated that most of the women receiving degrees that day were probably more excited about getting married and having children than entering the workforce, and that some Catholic leaders were “pushing dangerous gender ideologies onto the youth of America.”
Butker also assailed Pride month and railed against then-President Joe Biden’s stance on abortion, forcing the NFL to distance itself from the comments, saying in a statement: “His views are not those of the NFL as an organization. The NFL is steadfast in our commitment to inclusion, which only makes our league stronger.
As the summer gave way to election season, Butker was again in the spotlight for launching his UPRIGHT PAC, which claimed to have a goal of encouraging Christians to vote for what it described as “traditional values.” The PAC website was still active ahead of the Super Bowl and soliciting donations, but it does not describe where or how the money is spent.
Butker also spent time ahead of training camp in late July campaigning for Missouri Republican Sen. Josh Hawley, a staunch supporter of President Donald Trump and his policies, ahead of the general election.
Still, he was caught a little off guard by what kind of lightning rod for public notoriety he seemed to be heading into the season.
“It was a surprise because I’d been saying similar things to that for many years now and it’s funny what stuff gets picked up,” Butker said. “I said what I said. I believe in it. I don’t feel the need to apologize for anything. I feel like God’s prepared me for that moment to feel confident in who I am and what’s most important in my life and I’m able to handle whatever comes my way.
The season has been a roller coaster, too.
Butker hit a 51-yard field goal as time expired to give Kansas City a 26-25 win over the Bengals in Week 2. He had three field goals the following week that proved to be the difference in a win at Atlanta. And he kicked the go-ahead field goal in the fourth quarter of a 16-14 win over the Broncos in mid-November that kept the Chiefs barreling toward the No. 1 seed in the AFC.
After that game, though, Butker underwent surgery to repair a torn meniscus in his non-kicking knee. The injury and ensuing procedure affected the way he kicks — his left knee bends almost like a lunge when he hits the ball now — and may have been a big reason why, once Butker returned in mid-December, he missed an extra point and field goal attempt in consecutive weeks.
He’s been back on track in the playoffs, drilling a trio of field goals in a divisional-round win over Houston, then hitting the go-ahead 35-yard field goal with 3:33 remaining that helped Kansas City beat Buffalo 32-29 in the AFC championship gam
“It’s a positive to know that you can go out there and make kicks when it matters,” he said. “But every game is different.”
Still, he’s no stranger to Super Bowls at this point.
“I’ve gotten a lot better to handling the nerves leading up to the game,” Butker said. “I’ve been here before. I understand once the game starts it’s just like any other game. I also feel like I can pace myself a little bit so I’m not playing the game (in my head) before it’s actually played.
“Thankfully, I’ve played in many of these games and I have those memories to go back on,” he added. “But obviously you understand the magnitude of what this game is.”
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AP Sports Writer Dave Skretta in Kansas City, Missouri, contributed to this report.
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