All hail Harrison Butker, the buttkickingest kicker in the NFL

Welcome to Gramatica Errors, SB Nation’s weekly kicking and punting column. As always, we will do our best to avoid any and all foot puns. Now let’s kick things off ...

Rookie kicker Harrison Butker lifted Kansas City to a win over Washington on Monday Night Football when he drilled a 43-yard attempt with seconds remaining on the clock.

First off, I salute Butker for his Twitter handle, @buttkicker87. Sometimes it’s best not to overthink things. Your name is Butker, some kids (or grown men NFL coaches) call you butt kicker, you roll with it.

Secondly, good on Butker for rallying back after he missed a 46-yarder in the first half. Pulled off the Panthers practice team mid-week after an injury to Chiefs starter Cairo Santos, Butker had just a few days to get used to life in Kansas City ... and then he missed his first kick in his NFL debut. It would have been easy enough for the 22-year-old Georgia Tech product to shut down. He didn’t.

A few weeks ago I spoke with Chuck Zodda, special teams expert at Inside the Pylon and good friend to the column, about what makes a good pro. “Kicking is about three things,” he said. “Balance, torque, and the space between the ears.”

I have never really understood what torque means — though I have pretended to on several occasions when trying to discuss cars with my father-in-law — but that third part is interesting. As much as kicking motion or leg strength, field goal kicking is about being able to execute a swift and precise motion, perfectly, with the world watching you. Same as a golf putt to win a tournament or nailing a free throw with the game on the line. It’s not about the physical act, no. The key to being an excellent NFL kicker is having the ability to shut down the voice in your head, to lie to yourself, to convince your body not to shake in the immensity of the moment and, with it all on the line, to clear your head to a state of rhapsodic blankness and do.

Hey look at Butt Kicker’s rings!

Those are from his high school state championships in soccer. I also have high school soccer trophies, Harrison. We should be pals.

Blair Walsh had a somewhat shaky outing for the Seattle Seahawks on Sunday, when he went 1-2 in field goals, but missed a 37-yarder that had Seahawks fans raising eyebrows. Considering most of the Seahawks fans first knew Walsh as the man who gifted them a playoff win by missing a chip shot when he played for the Vikings, you can understand why they might not be convinced that he’s their solution at kicker.

You might be asking: Why would the Seahawks sign the player who had a completely memorable and catastrophic meltdown against them?

The answer, of course: He’s already proven he can win the Seahawks football games.

But seriously, thanks everyone. I’m here every Wednesday.

Jack Del Rio called the head ... scratchingest(?) play of the weekend when deep in his own territory he called for a fake punt on fourth-and-11 in the third quarter against Denver. Raiders punter Marquette King was quickly tackled and the Raiders turned the ball over on downs.

The Raiders were bailed out, however, because Broncos kicker Brandon McManus then missed a short field goal. It was a dark few moments for the Slipper Syndicate indeed.

But let’s return to Del Rio’s decision-making process. I don’t even care that he went for it, because whatever. I’m sure there’s some projection out there that shows why you should go for it every single time, no matter what the situation, and all that’s fine.

But you know what else is totally sweet? Watching Marquette King put his laces through a ball and seeing the triumphant parabola of a punt in flight.

Leave the razzle dazzle at home, Del Rio. You didn’t get here as a wild man bucking conventional wisdom. You got here by wearing team-issued leather jackets and winning 12 games with Jacksonville in 2005. Let King kick.

Jaguars punter Brad Nortman got a lot of love this weekend for several excellent punts against the Jets. Look at this!

Do you know why I love Twitter? Because I am actually able to write the sentence “Jaguars punter Brad Nortman got a lot of love this weekend for several excellent punts against the Jets” and have empirical evidence that this is true. Twenty-five years ago, would I have been able to write something like that and find evidence for it? Of course not. For one, 25 years ago, Nortman would have been three years old. I don’t care how talented a toddler he was, there just would not have been a lot of people talking about his punting ability. And second off, even if there were people talking about his punting, I would not have been able to gauge the temperature of the discussion unless I, like, commissioned a survey of his preschool. And I don’t even know where he went to preschool. I wouldn’t even know where to begin to look that up.