Harrison Butker’s rough first half against the Jets did more than cost the Chiefs points. It also sent one of his biggest public supporters into a full about-face.
Butker missed a 56-yard field goal late in the second quarter on Sunday, then got a second chance when a Jets defender jumped offsides. The redo didn’t help.
He pushed the next kick from 51 yards wide as well, and Arrowhead Stadium answered with boos. Justin Tucker, who was signed to the practice squad this season, watched from the sideline as the misses piled up.
That sequence hit Gehrig Dieter hard enough to reverse course in public. Dieter, who played for Kansas City from 2017 to 2021 alongside both Butker and Patrick Mahomes, had spent the week predicting a big finish for the kicker.
“I’m calling it now. Butker going to go on a generational run,” he wrote on X. “He won’t miss another kick the entire season.”
After the second miss, he came back with a very different tone.
“Missing the kick twice really just made me sad. Butker’s run in KC is done.
All time great. Big reason Chiefs have 3 Super Bowls.
Time to turn the page.”
It wasn’t a blast so much as a surrender. Dieter had already nudged the conversation toward another option after the Week 7 loss in Seattle, posting “Might be time to sign Justin Tucker” before Sunday’s game even happened. Butker’s struggles, though, have continued despite the team’s faith in him.
“We had a practice squad position open, so for security we brought him in and put him in that spot,” Reid said. “Butker gets it.
He knows that it’s part of this business. He’s struggled a little bit, and he gets that he needs to pick it up.”
The kicking drama wasn’t the only odd moment in Kansas City’s win.
Justin Fields’ day was over almost before it started. On third-and-1 from the Kansas City 34 in the first quarter, Reid used him for the Chiefs’ first quarterback sneak in three years.
Fields bobbled the snap, went down short of the line to gain, then watched the play get overturned into a fumble after New York won the replay challenge. Demario Davis recovered, and the Jets turned it into a field goal and a 6-0 lead.
Fields went 2-7 in nine starts for the Jets last season, and Kansas City brought him in to run packages like that one. He got one snap on Sunday, and that one snap handed New York three points.
Mahomes played through an elbow injury and still led Kansas City to a 23-point win. Fields got one chance and gave the Jets a field goal.
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