On his first day back at school, 55-year-old University of Georgia senior Kevin Butler remembered his backpack, the AC/DC lunch box his wife, Cathy, bought for him and the advice his daughter, Katie, provided free.
“I asked her what I should take to class, a book? And she said, ‘Dad, you’ll be the only one with a book — take a computer,’” said Butler, the former Bears kicker who returned to his alma mater in the fall to finally fulfill graduation requirements.
Butler took five academic courses and was the oldest student in each classroom. One professor remembered Butler as the classmate who kicked a 60-yard field goal with 11 seconds left to upset No. 2 Clemson — in 1984. The guy whose kicking career included making clutch field goals in full stadiums never had noticed everybody watching him quite like this.
“The first time I went to class, I felt like everyone looked at me and said, ‘Who’s the creepy guy in the back?’ or ‘Why is the janitor back there?’” Butler said. “But I enjoyed the classes. My three kids all got their degrees and were out of college, and this was something they always encouraged me to do. I go into a lot of business meetings, and the one thing I always lacked from other people was that diploma. It means something — or it does to me.”
In addition to coaching Georgia kickers and punters at the invitation of coach Kirby Smart for the team playing for a national championship Monday in Atlanta against Alabama, Butler completed his last science lab on campus Thursday and will graduate with a degree in business economics. The assimilation process went smoothly enough that one faculty member enlisted Butler’s help in getting Georgia football players involved in a holiday community service project in Athens, Ga.
“He was a mature student and great example,” said Robert Miles, the director of life skills for the Georgia athletic department and a starting defensive end on the Bulldogs’ last national champions in 1980. “Kevin took this challenge very seriously.”
The vice president of sales for UgMO Technologies, Butler balanced his time well enough to finish his senior thesis on water conservation and earn an A or B in every class but one. A business statistics class forced Butler to brush up on calculus for the first time in 38 years, and he barely passed.
“That was as hard as pulling your teeth out,” Butler said.
But then Butler fully understands overcoming pain in the name of progress. Not many people know about Butler’s battle with dyslexia, which he says shaped his life after the learning disability forced him to repeat third grade.
“My mom kept me back because I couldn’t read,” Butler said. “It was horrific at the time, hiding from fourth-graders in the hall. But I learned how to deal with it.”
Boyhood summers growing up in Stone Mountain, Ga., were spent at nearby Emory University dealing with the issue. Butler’s focus improved. He eventually retrained his eyes. He slowly restored his self-confidence. He matured into a young man who thought he could persevere through anything.
“It’s funny when you look at a learning disability that held me back changed my life and gave me all the opportunities I’ve had,” said Butler, who still reverses letters and inverts words when he gets tired. “You just deal with it.”
Coaching enables Butler to share his life experiences with players, from his days as an All-American who scored 353 points at Georgia to his successes in Chicago. One of Butler’s favorite Bears stories involved calling Cathy, then his fiancee, after reporting to Platteville, Wis., as a rookie to tell her they needed to postpone their wedding scheduled for Jan. 25, 1986 — because Super Bowl XX was Jan. 26, and one team meeting convinced the kicker the Bears would be playing.
Nobody in Chicago influenced Butler more than coach Mike Ditka, whom the designated student assistant thinks of every time he gets candid with a Georgia punter or kicker.
“From my great coach Ditka, I tell them the truth whether they like it or not,” Butler said. “I trained myself to be one of the most mentally tough kickers out there. I had to. Coach Ditka was my favorite coach, but he was a hard-ass. I have to find that balance.”
Finding satisfaction is easy, such as when Georgia kicker Rodrigo Blankenship hit a Rose Bowl-record 55-yard field goal at the end of the first half that provided momentum in the double-overtime victory over Oklahoma. Butler beamed, an accidental staff member feeling as proud as anybody on the Georgia sideline.
As Butler has worked with Blankenship and the rest of the Bulldogs kickers and punters this week, he has recounted the 1983 Sugar Bowl in which No. 2 Penn State beat No. 1 Georgia.
“My remark to my guys is write your own history, don’t repeat it, because nobody remembers that 1982 season,” Butler said. “They knocked us off that year. And now the old guy gets one more crack at it.”
Meeting college goals still matters to the Georgia senior.
Twitter @DavidHaugh
