Michael Oher — Blindsided by Fame
It’s all fun and games until your scandal is broadcast to the whole world and, next thing you know, you’re benched. Even when the media attention that athletes get isn’t necessarily negative, it’s fair to say that entertainment and athleticism just aren’t a good mix because it tends to do more harm than good when the whole world is not only watching your every move, but also criticizing you along the way. It’s clear that celebrity status comes at a price.
As I watched the 2009 film ‘The Blind Side,’ I couldn’t help but wonder how the celebrity status that Michael Oher, former NFL player for the Baltimore Ravens, Tennessee Titans and Carolina Panthers, gained after the release of this film may have affected his career as an athlete. According to Ashley Collman from DailyMail.com, Michael Oher actually blames the movie for wrecking his NFL Career. Collman wrote in 2015, “since the films release, Oher’s career has plummeted and he has been cut from two different teams in the past six years.”
Sports are inherently entertaining, but there is a big difference between entertaining fans by just doing your job which is to play your sport, and going deeper into the role of an entertainer by going after the celebrity status that most athletes desire. The difference is that after playing your sport, your life after the game is private. The world doesn’t know everything bout you. However, the life of a celebrity isn’t so private.
Oher’s downward spiral as a football player became a trending topic after word got out about a physical altercation between Oher and defensive end Kony Ealy at a training camp with his then-current NFL team, the Carolina Panthers. When Oher was asked if the fight had anything to do with him proving himself after a few struggling seasons, Oher told David Newton, ESPN Staff Writer, “I’m not trying to prove anything. People look at me, and they take things away from me because of a movie. They don’t really see the skills and the kind of player I am.” As Ashley Collman mentioned in her DailyMail article, when Oher says that things have been taken away from him, he is referring to the fact that he is not taken as seriously in the NFL and has been cut from 2 teams since the release of the film. Athletes who cross the line and double as a celebrity are watched by the public even closer than the athletes who remain just athletes.
Usually, it’s the best athletes who become more of celebrities. This is why the fight between Oher and Ealy was such a big deal at the time. In Oher’s case, he didn’t willingly step into the world of entertainment. A movie was made about his life, which unfortunately for him was his ‘claim to fame’. When speaking to DailyMail.com, Oher made it clear that he was aware that he received more judgment than others because of how the film negatively impacted his athletic career. Oher told DailyMail.com in 2015, “nobody is paying attention to the offensive line. But me? I’m getting watched for everything. I know what type of player I am. Everybody else that I know knows what type of player I am. So that kind of stuff doesn’t worry me.” Too much attention from the media can negatively affect one’s career no matter the level at which the sport is being played.
I talked briefly with my father James DuBose, former football player at Wake Forest University and NFL player for the Detroit Lions in 1990, about his thoughts on the intersection of entertainment and sports. “I committed to Wake Forest because I wanted to play for a team that would be on TV, so I understand the desire to have everyone watching,” he told me. “But, I think there’s a limit. I’ve seen guys get penalized because of something they did outside of the team.” DuBose was unable to disclose specific examples for privacy reason. “When you sign up to double as an athlete and a figure in entertainment, you have to know that your every move is going to be watched and criticized.”When I asked DuBose about how the media can affect the team as a whole he responded by saying, “When a player is all over social media because of something [scandalous] that they did, it definitely affects more than just that player,” he said. “In my opinion, if you sign up to be part of a team, that’s where your head needs to be at all times. You can’t be worried about fame; just play your sport and be great at it.”
Oher’s downhill spiral wouldn’t be the first time we’ve seen the media ruin an athlete’s career. Let’s take the infamous cyclist Lance Armstrong for example. He became so glorified as a celebrity that he got away with doping for seven years. Armstrong’s team and some of the reporters who were interviewing him were willing to look past his lie and go along with it because at some point they chose to be a fan rather than do their actual jobs. Most currently, NBA player Tristan Thompson of the Cleveland Cavaliers was blasted in the media for cheating on his pregnant girlfriend, Khloe Kardashian. This led to the attention being focused on Thompson’s scandal rather than the work of the overall team.
