Maybe it’s not about being an heir, a football player, a movie topic, or a recruit. Maybe it’s about love and family. He said he just recently discovered he wasn’t adopted. Maybe he felt betrayed. He believed he was adopted into a family out of love, but found out it was a lie. How would anyone feel if that happened to them?
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He knew it in 2011 (when his book was published, if not before).
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Seeing that Michael was the only athlete ( i am aware of) to be directed toward Ole Miss; it seems unlikely the Tuohys were a conduit of athletic talent for the university. I am sure there were/are lots of corrupt things happening in college athletics but sometimes it is just a family trying to help.
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I never agreed, because there was plenty of time for an adult adoption, which according to numerous attorneys was the way to go IF they really wanted to adopt him.
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Again - even in the book he equates conservatorship with adoption, because they told him it was the same thing. He was deceived.
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Absolutely. I don’t understand how people can be ‘certain’ of what any of the people involved were thinking, or what they understood…enough so to seemingly take a side. We all know what people write in books isn’t always accurate, correct? And that the movie wasn’t a documentary, and did take liberties with the truth?
I’m certain I don’t know everything that happened here…when Michael was 16, 18, or 28 or now. I don’t know what the Tuohys were thinking or what their legal advice was. We don’t know what the players’ motivations were/are. It does seem that a once happy family has become estranged, but maybe none of that was real either. Who knows? It’s unfortunate that this is playing out in public and that threads like this and other social media outlets have so many people with such strong opinions based on incomplete information.
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As someone posted, folks see what they want to see. Some don’t want reality to interfere with the fairytale story they enjoyed in a movie. I reiterate, major college athletics is a dirty nasty business, not the Pollyanna story told in the BlindSide movie. Admissions offices have specific personnel who deal with athletic admissions----very different standards.
The Tuohys like most boosters supported the university with $$$$$. In this case they had the chance to hand deliver a blue chip athlete to their beloved alma mater. Those who think offers from other schools were presented to Oher for his consideration are deluding themselves, to keep the fairy tale alive.
I may sound cynical and jaded, but that’s the world of college sports----a business worth billions.
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That would be quite an ironic conclusion to make given Oher himself has raised two children he very much considers ‘part of his family’ that he also didn’t formally adopt in the past 20yrs.
In terms of “family” who had always gone to Ole Miss, he was referring to the Tuohys, correct?
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It is confusing to me that he knew for over a decade that it was a conservatorship, yet he thought it was the same as an adoption. He claims that he’s smart, not dumb, but he just figured this out? I don’t know much, but even I know that Google is my friend. None of this stuff is a mystery.
I’m also confused that he claiming that now he feels mislead, yet he has been estranged from the family for over a decade. I wonder why there has been an estrangement for such a long time?
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Michael Oher attended Collins Tuohy’s wedding in 2006 but something must have happened after that to cause an estrangement.
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That’s from the movie so who knows if if actually said it? But in the movie the character was definitely referring to the Tuohy’s.
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Article re: recruitment, college choice
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Interesting article - thanks.
Article excepted below. It is hard to know though if what Oher said at the time was genuine or done as an attempt to protect people he cared about.
“In an interview with The Memphis Commercial Appeal on Feb. 3, 2005, Oher said the choice to attend Ole Miss was strictly his.
“It was crazy. It’s still crazy,” Oher said. “Everybody thinks I went to Ole Miss because of the Tuohy family. I did what I wanted to do. I made a decision myself.”
Sean Tuohy frequently spoke to the press about the lengths to which he went to recuse himself from Oher’s recruitment. He said he refused to discuss Oher’s college decision with him.
Oher said he knew Tuohy would support him in whatever decision he made, adding that he had figured out how to arrange his schedule to be in Knoxville on gamedays if Oher had chosen the Vols.
“It was hard for him not to say anything,” Oher said. “Deep down inside, I know he probably wanted me to go to Ole Miss.””
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Interesting opinion column from today’s Chicago Tribune.
Nina Metz: ‘The Blind Side’ and Hollywood’s willful blindness to the truth?
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I was curious to read Roger Ebert’s opinion of the Blind Side, since his movie reviews were more nuanced than average for white critics (possibly because his wife, step kids, grandchildren etc are Black.) But Ebert didn’t review it! This had to have been a deliberate omission, as he reviewed every other Oscar-nominated film. My guess is he knew how problematic the film was, but kept his mouth shut because Michael Oher seemingly endorsed the film, so to call out the film would have been an insult to this young man. I wish Ebert were still alive to weigh in now.
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Interesting. As early as when Oher was starting his NFL career, he spoke out against the movie. However, he said it was so popular and seemed to inspire a lot of good, so he didn’t make a big deal about it.
There was an interesting interview with the actor who played him in the movie. The two didn’t meet until after the film was made, so he didn’t know Oher at all aside from the script. He was told by movie execs, producers and so forth that Oher was “different” than he was as a younger man and didn’t want the “new and improved” Oher to get in the way of the portrayal.
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Just saw this on The Today Show.
They’re reporting there’s a new legal motion with more accusations. From the Today show clip Oher claims he has “no knowledge of the income generated…from the (Tuohy’s) use of his name, likeness and image” over the years.
Michael Ohr’s own book “I Beat the Odds” written in 2011 specifically states he knew about the conservatorship and knew it wasn’t the same as adoption. He actually said he liked the Blind Side book over the movie and the story was correct.
The Tuohy’s took Michael in and he was looking to go into basketball–not football. His HS GPA was 0.06. He had a tutor get him through college. The Tuohy’s worked at first at getting him a basketball scholarship. Football was secondary. The money made was evenly split–Michael got/and still gets his share. He has refused the recent money but the Tuohy’s created a trust and now puts the money there. I find it interesting that all this is “new” as he has another book coming out.
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Interesting info about basketball possibility. Other posts have talked about his football successes prior to his transfer to private school(?)