Tim Tebow Responds To Twitter Campaign For Injured Teen
Say what you will about Tim Tebow’s athletic abilities or religious beliefs, but we can probably all agree that he’s proven more often than not that he’s at least a pretty decent guy. Case in point, The New York Jets backup QB reached out to a hospitalized upstate New York teenager after a viral Twitter campaign caught his attention.
Tebow reached out to Matt Hardy, a 17-year-old Shenenhehowa High School student who was in the hospital suffering from injuries stemming from a Saturday night car crash, reports ESPN. Two of his fellow students were killed in the two-car accident, according to reports. The driver of the other vehicle failed roadside sobriety tests at the scene.
At roughly 7 pm that night, the hashtag #TebowCallMatt started trending nationally on Twitter, with more than 50,000 Twitter users retweeting the hashtag. Another 16,000 retweeted #MissyCallBailey, reaching out to Olympic swimmer Missy Franklin and trying to get her to contact Bailey Wind, another teen who survived the crash.
The Twitter campaign caught Tebow’s attention rather quickly as he called Hardy after 9 pm. After the phone call, Hardy’s brother tweeted: “TIM TEBOW JUST GOT OFF THE PHONE WITH MATT! SUCH A CLASS ACT!!”
Tebow himself tweeted of the call: “Thanks to everyone who got #TebowCallMatt trending & helped connect us. Matt truly inspired me. God bless y’all.”
Hardy is himself an athlete, who plays football, baseball, and basketball at his school. He is now in stable condition at Albany Medical Center with a concussion and a few broken bones.
Missy Franklin tweeted around midnight that she had left a voicemail for Wind.
