In 2011, the Toronto Blue Jays drafted an 18 year old pitcher named Daniel Norris out of Johnson City, Tennessee, and handed him a $2 million signing bonus. He went out and bought his dream vehicle with it. A 1978 Volkswagen Westfalia camper. Mustard yellow. Ten thousand dollars. Older than he was. He named it Shaggy. Then he moved into it. For the next several years, while his teammates rented condos and apartments during spring training, Norris slept in the back of that van. He tried parking near the beach at first. The police told him to move along and suggested a Walmart. So he parked behind the Walmart, next to the dumpsters. ESPN's Eli Saslow went and found him there in 2015 and described the morning routine. Norris waking up behind the dumpsters, digging through a half-empty cooler for eggs, smelling them to decide if they were still good, cooking them on a portable stove. Pulling the entire contents of his life into the parking lot to clean out the van. A surfboard. A subzero sleeping bag. One pair of jeans. Handwritten journals. Shoppers would stop and stare. He'd wave at them. At that point he had a 96 mile per hour fastball, a Nike deal, a couple million dollars in the bank, and he was living on $800 a month. That was the number he told his financial advisers to deposit into his checking account. Everything else stayed invested. The Blue Jays were not thrilled about it. Norris said the organization told him plainly they didn't think it was a good idea, and asked him why he was doing it. "You've got to understand, I've been doing stuff like this my whole life." He wasn't performing. He was trying to stay sane. "It's like a yin-and-yang thing for me. I'm not going to change who I am just because people think it's weird. The only way I'm going to have a great season is by starting out happy and balanced and continuing to be me." Then baseball saved his life. In April 2015, Norris's fastball started dipping under 90. The Blue Jays wondered if he was hurt, so they sent him in to get his throwing arm examined. The doctors weren't looking for cancer. They found it anyway. Thyroid cancer, in a 21 year old. If his arm hadn't been off, nobody would have been looking. He was traded to Detroit that July, in the David Price deal. He had surgery that offseason and beat it. Then he spent the winter surfing in Nicaragua, driving the van out to Oregon, and serving as grand marshal of the holiday parade back home in Johnson City. He was 22 years old. His Instagram bio at the time read: in search of three things. Eternal life. The strike zone. Good waves. Most athletes who come into money spend it proving they have it. Daniel Norris got two million dollars at 18, bought a van older than himself, parked it by a dumpster, and lived like he had nothing at all. For more stories like this, follow us on any platform @thesportsontap