Michael Oher: When Your Back's Against the Wall

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Welch's. Let's fruit stuff up. With the movie in particular, did it roughly tell you a story? I know you didn't love the way the movie came out, but were you happy with the fact that Michael Orr's name got out there and what you overcame to be what you became? No, I'm thrilled to have a movie made about me.

It's surreal, actually. I think what it did was gave me a position to be in and that I'm honored to be able to motivate and inspire generations behind me. Other things led to me saying, where people may think I don't like the movie, but no, being where I'm from, the roads that I had to travel to have a movie made about you that inspired the world, Know Your Name, you can continue to have a great platform to give back.

And writing books, When Your Back's Against the Wall, my new book. So no, it's all good and I'm still chasing greatness and trying to make it happen. So your long-term coach was John Harbaugh. So I wrote him last night and I asked him, I texted him, I said, I know how busy you are, but I said, Michael Orr's coming on, what can you tell me? He said he did whatever the team needed. He treated people so well, especially kids. He was a huge deal while he was here, but always was great with people. What struck me was, as interesting as his story in the movie was, there was way more there with Mike. Very thoughtful, very smart.

Much more depth. That's great coming from Coach Harbaugh. I wouldn't expect anything less from him. He's a great guy.

No, he's a great man. A great guy. Loved playing for him.

Hard nose. My type of coach. Every day is going to be a war out there on the practice field. And, you know, dealing in sports, especially in the NFL, I always hear guys talking about preseason and practice and how, you know, they treated preseason and you got to warm up and, you know, this game right here, you're only going to play a couple games and, you know, once the speed's going to change in the, once the regular season come around or the speed changes in the playoffs, the lights get bigger.

The speed never changed for me because of Coach Harbaugh. I mean, preseason, it was a real game. Preseason game number two. These were playoff-type atmosphere games for, at least for us in the trenches, the defensive line, the offensive line. We went out there trying to win every game. And that's the, that was the Ravens mentality. That's Coach Harbaugh's mentality.

And I know they were on the streak for 16, 20 preseason wins. And that's the mentality he had. And that's what I loved about him.

Every day he was going to be the same. I mean, that's why the one thing, they were the most consistent winning team you guys were in the NFL. That's why he's got the job for all these years.

It's almost unheard of. And that's why when I talk about football, it's only going to be a five, six teams who's going to be in the running year in and year out. That's because they have that foundation right there.

Yeah, the organization from top to bottom who believe in winning. So your story, you should not have been successful as you were. Tell everybody what you were dealing with as a kid growing up. First memory at three years old is being homeless from three to 10 in and out of foster care on the streets at 10 years old. I was on the streets for a year alone, alone, running from authorities because I ran away from foster care at 10 years old. And in order for me to not go back, I had to go house from house, apartment to apartment, couch to couch because I knew they were looking for me. They finally found me at 11, put me into a hospital. Probably the best two, three weeks of my life because I had a clean bed.

I had three meals a day, could watch TV movies all day long. So after about three weeks, they were going to take me somewhere. So I ran away from there. And that's when the journey started.

They gave up custody, then look for me after that. And the journey really started right there, started to go to school on my own. I needed a routine because I was tired already at that young age. And that's when this journey really started for me.

And I looked I was looking around and I got some of the principles and my new book and some of the playbooks. And one is looking yourself in the mirror. And I knew at 11 years old, I'd seen so much new no drugs, violence, drugs, violence, everything you can imagine. I knew the people around me couldn't save me. So when I looked in the mirror, I said, it's going to be up to you. You have you have every answer you have, you know right from wrong, you have all the tools that you need. And that started with education, going to school on my own, doing the right thing, just doing the opposite, what was around me. And did that come from in you? There's no one who said, hey, this is Michael, this is the right way to do it. These guys don't have your best interests.

Going to do things that are going to break the law and get you in trouble is going to be negative. I mean, it seems obvious, but you made that decision on your own at 12? On my own at 12, 11, 12, because I had seen so much.

I was like I said, I was tired. And I made the conscious decision to just do the opposite. When did you realize you were smart? I realized I was different every day as a kid because I wasn't caught up, like you said, in the violence and the gangs and drugs.

And I just knew I was different. I realized I had a ton of potential in the classroom once I got out to the private school that I graduated from. And I started to excel in the classroom. Did athletics get you to that private school? Of course.

I think it would have been tough coming from where I came from academically to get in there. So that's what I say in this book as well, meeting people halfway. I had to meet them halfway in the classroom as an athlete. I understood. I had something to offer and someone else had something to offer. So that's with me.

You got to meet someone. You have to bring some to the table if you want to be successful in life. I mean, that's just the reality of it all. You know, you have to be doing something positive.

And that's just the world the country will live in. And then you ended up in a pretty nice situation, right? In high school?

9th, 10th, 11th grade. I was sleeping from couch to couch, on the floors. And you're talking about my senior year. I moved in with the Toohey family. But before then, I was 18 when I moved in.

I was an All-American football player when I moved in a couple weeks before. That's where it's a little different. The movie in life.

Yeah. A couple weeks before high school, I moved in. So, you know, that's what I want young people to know in this book right here. Because they see, oh, you got taken in and they raised you.

And now, 18 years old, from 3 to 18, I had went through a lot of triumphs and trials and obstacles to get to that point. Yeah, I guess you have a choice, Michael. At one point, it's like, life's against me.

Life sucks. If no one cares about me, I'm not going to care about that. I'm going to do whatever I want.

And in other words, it's the survivor instinct. I'm going to do whatever it takes to be successful. I'm going to show them, right? I'm going to show the world.

You're not going to discount me. Do you remember having that moment? No, that's how I thought as a kid. I thought that I was even, I don't know why I was thinking it, but I thought that I was something special. And I was different. I carried myself that way. I wasn't, if what I was doing wasn't cool, as the kids said back then, that was fine with me. I was going to do what was cool to me. I wasn't going to try to, I was going to be the leader. I was going to lead her. I was going to dictate the way my life planned out, panned out.

So those were, that was my mindset. And by the way, not only does your life plan out, you have a great athletic career. You have this moment, February 3rd, 2013, cut 36. And he booms this one. That takes the free kick out of play. And it's down, down to the 40.

Step on his feet. That's defective. And the Ravens have won it. 34-31. The Super Bowl belongs to Baltimore. What was that like? I was on the field that day, by the way, because you guys had the blackout in New Orleans.

That gave me chills right there. I was waiting to lose that game, actually. Once the momentum goes in the NFL, it's gone.

You can't get it back. And I was surprised we won it. We were up 30-something, three years, something like that, and winning that game. But it put everything in perspective to me. I just sat there after the game. Beating the 49ers and Jim Harbaugh. Exactly. Great game.

A good friend of mine, Patrick Willis, beating him when we went to college together. I just sat there and thought. I thought about what it took for me to get to that point. And football is the greatest game in the world. You sit around as a kid. I can remember paying for it.

I had to sell newspapers as a kid. And I would pay someone five bucks to record the Dallas Cowboys. And I would watch it once I got back home as a kid. That's how much you loved the game.

That's how much I loved it. I didn't have anything, but I would pay five bucks for someone to record the Cowboys. We went through so many losing seasons.

I need my money back. But no, it was just unbelievable for me to know what I went through and hard work. It had all paid off, and it's something that I can't tell you the feeling.

So now that you've had the situation, the Sanibel career, celebrity, movie on your life, you have this book out now. It's called When Your Back's Against the Wall, Fame, Football, and Lessons Learned Through a Lifetime of Adversity. Can you still channel that resourcefulness and that grit, even though you don't need it necessarily in this portion of your life?

Do you steal that same guy? And is there a fear of losing it all because you know what that's like? It's a fear every day. That's why I'm chasing greatness because that fear of where I've come from and the fear of putting everything that I've gone through in this book, When Your Back's Against the Wall, for other young people like myself so they won't have to go through these things.

And to have that mentor to show them that they have great potential when everything else around them is bleak. If you didn't have the athletic ability, do you still believe you would have broke out? Well, that's the thing.

That was plan B. I didn't want to be a statistic. Being successful for me was having three or four jobs, and I thought that I can outwork anybody. You know, five, six jobs. I've been working since I was seven years old.

So you would have been the guy with three jobs working? I'm telling you, I had ambitions of just being successful at something. And at times, when I look back, sometimes I think football might have slowed me down a little bit to reach my greatest potential.

So I've always thought different. I've always, second grade, I get up and do plays in front of the school and speeches and reading and writing, and that's something people don't know about me. I've always been ambitious and just wanting to be different and want to be successful. And just always wanted to be a positive influence on society. And as you know, there's more than ever, you see so many kids growing up in single-parent homes without that mentor or role model. Have you had that experience of going to these schools that don't have a lot? And what are the kids asking you?

I say it a lot, and it definitely saddens me. That's why when I interviewed the kids to come through the foundation, when I'm partnering with schools to give them a better education and offering them that mentorship and that education and community, that's so important to me. And they ask me, how did I do it? And the most important thing I can tell them is take it one day at a time, believe that you're something special, and you have to have want to, and you have to take it one day at a time and stack days on top of days. And whatever you want your future to be, you have to change your mindset.

Got it. And it sounds like you made it happen. No one could say, well, I had it worse. Very few people could say Michael Oher.

I hadn't met him yet. Michael Oher, pick up his book. It's now out, written with Don Yeager, a great writer. One of your backs against the wall, fame, football, and lessons learned through a lifetime of adversity. Got a lot of football in it, but it's mostly about life. Mike, great to finally meet you in person. Nice to meet you, Bill. Thanks for having me on. Listen to the show ad-free on Fox News Podcast Plus, on Apple Podcast, Amazon Music with your Prime membership, or subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.