Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker made a stir during the offseason with his comments during a commencement address. He doesn’t intend to do that during the season.
“I’m going to stand behind what it is I’m saying,’' Butker told reporters on Wednesday, via Adam Teicher of ESPN.com. “I kind of look at the offseason as a little bit of a maybe five-month period where I can just represent me as Harrison Butker as a faithful Catholic. And then obviously when it gets to the season, I try to focus as much as I can on football and not being a distraction for the Chiefs.”
Butker believes his status as the kicker of the Chiefs gives him a “platform.”
“So with that comes people that want me to state what I believe to be very important,” Butker said.
Most people, frankly, don’t care what any kicker has to say. About anything. In this case, however, Butker’s comments landed squarely in the outrage/outrage-at-the-outrage wheelhouse that drives modern media.
Indeed, his comments did carry more than a whiff of the culture wars that tend to influence the electorate as much or more than policy issues. And the various beliefs articulated throughout Butker’s commencement address can fairly be characterized as political commentary in religious clothing.
Which is fine; he has the right to say whatever he wants to say. And others have the right to respond.
He’s good enough as a kicker to pull it off. The question is whether and to what extent this previously anonymous kicker will become a target for opposing fans — and whether any taunts, catcalls, and/or signs he sees at road games will affect his ability to perform his one job of putting the biscuit in the giant, three-sided yellow basket.