#OlsenWPMOYchallenge

Chances are if you were on social media yesterday, whether it was Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc, your feed was inundated with this hashtag. Happily, it was for a good reason, and the news feed spam was not in vain.

Greg Olsen handily won an overwhelming victory in the social media portion of the Walter Payton Man of the Year challenge on Sunday. This portion of the contest grants an additional $25,000 to the charity of a players choice beyond the amounts they get for being nominated, becoming a finalist, or winning. Olsen announced yesterday that he and his wife would match a dollar for every re-tweet up to 25,000 retweets that his hashtag got on Sunday. Well... its a good thing he put that limit on there, or he would be out around $600,000.

Olsen began the day on Sunday down almost 100,000 mentions to San Francisco nominee, WR Torrey Smith. As the day unfolded though, possibly thanks to most of North Carolina being snowed inside their houses, the rush was on to get him into first place. Panthers fans came out in droves so incredible... that Torrey Smith wondered aloud if Olsen might be involved in some kind of sinister activity designed to specifically rig a vote system.

I called them but they were busy on something else? #OlsenWPMOYChallenge https://t.co/614Ym2Qt97 — Greg Olsen (@gregolsen88) January 8, 2017

Torrey realizes that all of this is for good causes however, and its all love in the NFL community.

His charity impacts....he's been doing it for a while now and I hope @gregolsen88 or @89SteveSmith win the REAL WPMOY award this year — Torrey Smith (@TorreySmithWR) January 8, 2017

Even a few celebrities got in on the action. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, another famous University of Miami alum, helped out tremendously by spreading the word on his Twitter feed. While William Shatner... hit... the... retweet... button... for........ the cause.

One of my fav players and "The U" family. Does so much for children. Let's help by hash tagging #OlsenWPMOYChallenge https://t.co/XTKjKov2s7 — Dwayne Johnson (@TheRock) January 8, 2017

Greg's almost at #1 keep tweeting! #OlsenWPMOYChallenge — William Shatner (@WilliamShatner) January 8, 2017

Ultimately, thanks to that KEEP POUNDING spirit of the fans, Greg Olsen finished the day with over 1,000,000 mentions. An unprecedented sum, and certainly the largest single day swing in the history of the contest. While official results won’t be posted until the 12th of this month, it was pretty clear at the end of Sunday evening that Olsen had won this portion of the event, taking a commanding 500,000 mention lead over the aforementioned Smith.

It should be noted however that this does NOT mean that Greg has won the actual Walter Payton Man of the Year award. That contest is not decided via fan vote, though I am sure the committee will take a look at these numbers and it might help influence their decision. Here is hoping that Greg eventually gets that recognition for everything he does to help the community, though no winner of the award would be a bad selection. It would also be great to see Steve Smith Sr. win the award in his last year in the league.

One more time, just for good measure.

#OlsenWPMOYchallenge

#KeepPounding