The family featured in the Hollywood blockbuster “The Blind Side” fired back Monday at ex-NFLer Michael Oher’s claims they swindled him, calling the allegations “insulting” and hurtful.
Oher, 37, filed a lawsuit in Shelby County, Tenn., court Monday saying he only recently learned he wasn’t officially adopted by Sean and Leigh Anne Tuohy and that he was instead duped into a conservatorship, which allowed the family to rake in millions of dollars in royalties from the movie about his life.
But Sean Tuohy told the Daily Memphian that the claims have “devastated” the family.
Tuohy said the conservatorship was drawn up to ensure that Oher was eligible to play football at the University of Mississippi.
Tuohy is a booster at the school, and if Oher wasn’t part of the family, there could have been potential NCAA issues sending him there, Tuohy suggested.
“I sat Michael down and told him, ‘If you’re planning to go to Ole Miss — or even considering Ole Miss — we think you have to be part of the family. This would do that legally,'” Tuohy said.
“We contacted lawyers who had told us that we couldn’t adopt over the age of 18; the only thing we could do was to have a conservatorship. We were so concerned it was on the up-and-up that we made sure the biological mother came to court.”
Tuohy also dismissed the idea that the family profited handsomely from the movie.
“We didn’t make any money off the movie,” Touhy said. “Well, Michael Lewis, the [author of the book on which the movie was based] gave us half of his share. Everybody in the family got an equal share, including Michael. It was about $14,000, each.”
Tuohy sold his conglomerate of fast-food franchises for $200 million and took affront to the idea that he would want to profit off of Oher.
“I will say it’s upsetting that people would think I would want to make money off any of my children,” he said.
He said the family had remained close with Oher throughout much of his NFL career but noticed distance building about a year and a half ago.
“No question, the allegations are insulting,” Tuohy said of the suit. “But, look, it’s a crazy world. You’ve got to live in it. It’s obviously upset everybody.”
Tuohy’s son, Sean Tuohy Jr., also told his side of the story in an interview with Barstool Radio on Monday.
“I’m gonna preface this by saying that I love Mike at 16, I love Mike at 37, and I [will] love him at 67,” Tuohy Jr. said of Oher.
“There’s not gonna be any dossier or thing that happens that is going to make me say, ‘Screw that guy.’ That’s not the case,” Tuohy Jr. said.
But Tuohy Jr. disputed the idea that Oher just learned about the conservatorship in February of 2023.
“If he says he found out in February, I find that hard to believe,” he said.
“I went through my family group texts today to see what had been said. There were things in like 2020 or 2021 that said, ‘If you guys give me this much, then I won’t go public with things.’
“I think everybody learned about conservatorships in the past year because of Britney Spears, so maybe that’s the case,” Tuohy Jr. said.
Tuohy Jr. acknowledged Oher’s frustration over not getting paid out more for “The Blind Side” but added that he didn’t make much money from the movie, either, estimating he personally has received about $60,000 to $70,000 in royalties over the years.
“You’re not gonna hear me talk bad about him because I truthfully think very highly of everything [about his NFL career and how he has raised a family],” Tuohy Jr. said of Oher.
He said he has “great memories” of Oher, including the former football star buying him his first car, a Dodge Challenger, and going to college in Baltimore to be close to Oher, who was playing for the Ravens at the time.
Oher’s suit claimed that he had no “familial” status with the Tuohys in the conservatorship.
“The lie of Michael’s adoption is one upon which Co-Conservators Leigh Anne Tuohy and Sean Tuohy have enriched themselves at the expense of their Ward, the undersigned Michael Oher,” the legal filing said.
“Michael Oher discovered this lie to his chagrin and embarrassment in February of 2023, when he learned that the Conservatorship to which he consented on the basis that doing so would make him a member of the Tuohy family, in fact provided him no familial relationship with the Tuohys.”