Harrison Butker aided Chiefs teammate BJ Thompson during seizure, cardiac arrest

NFL

By Andrew Crane

When BJ Thompson suffered a seizure during a Chiefs team meeting Thursday, kicker Harrison Butker played a critical role in alerting medical personnel in the training room.

He “immediately ran” toward that space and grabbed assistant athletic trainers Julie Frymyer and David Glover — as well as vice president of sports performance and medicine Rick Burkholder — to assist, and other medical professionals later joined them, Burkholder told reporters, according to NFL Network.

“As a team, we tried to stabilize BJ and put him on the floor while he was still seizing,” Burkholder said. “Then he went into cardiac arrest. Our team of that group of people provided CPR for him, he had one AD shock and came back so he was only in cardiac arrest for less than a minute — minute and a half. 

“Our players, our security staff, everybody involved, coaches and staff, they were phenomenal in handling the crisis.”

Earlier Thursday, Thompson suffered the seizure and went into cardiac arrest during a special teams meeting, which prompted the Chiefs to cancel the rest of their team activities Thursday before resuming their OTAs on Friday. 

Thompson was “awake and responsive” Friday, just over 12 hours after his agent told NFL Network in another statement that Thompson hadn’t regained consciousness yet but was stable.

He was on a ventilator overnight, according to Burkholder, and the Chiefs had just, by chance, practiced their emergency action plan Monday — something they’re required to do multiple times each season.

Chiefs defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo said Thursday that “it was scary” and added that “the guys were a little bit scared,” according to Fox 4 Kansas City.

“I know I was,” the former Giants defensive coordinator and interim head coach said.

Thompson was a fifth-round pick out of Stephen F. Austin in 2023, and he recorded two tackles during his lone appearance — a Week 18 win — last year.

“We don’t have a diagnosis, and in medicine sometimes you don’t have that,” Burkholder said. “And then like I said, he’s awake and he’s alert, and he’s headed in the absolute right direction.”

And Butker, a three-time Super Bowl champion whose controversial commencement speech — which described “homemaker” as one of the most important roles for women, among other comments that were described by some as homophobic and sexist — at Benedictine College generated plenty of attention earlier this offseason, certainly helped with his quick thinking.