In the parking lot of the spring training camp for the Toronto Blue Jays in Dunedin, Fla., one of these things is not like the others.
Picture them, and see if you can pick the odd man out: a luxury SUV, a $100,000 BMW, a tricked-out Escalade and a 1978 Volkswagen Westfalia mini-bus.
This is a real situation for the Blue Jays. The mini-bus, named “Shaggy” after the Scooby Doo character, belongs to the shaggy-bearded 21-year-old pitcher Daniel Norris.
Despite a $2 million signing bonus with the baseball club, Norris prefers to live the solitary, simple life in his mini-bus in the off-season, touring around and making the 1,100-kilometre trek from his home in Tennessee to the Dunedin spring training camp each year.
His van is typically parked in the parking lot of the city’s 24-hour Wal-Mart.
He cooks his meals on a camping stove, and spends his free time camping in the wilderness and surfing.
He does pullups and pushups in the parking lot of the retail giant, and is used to a fair amount of curious attention.
Some passersby offer him money or prayers, thinking he’s in a tough situation financially.
In reality, they couldn’t be more wrong.
He’s a young multi-millionaire who simply chooses to live in the raggedy van.
He looks every bit the rugged outdoorsman in the off-season, but when baseball starts up again, he’ll shave the beard and move in with a teammate.
He tells media he is committed to his job on the team and takes his career with the Blue Jays seriously and is figuring out how much give and take there is in terms of reconciling his freewheeling, solitary lifestyle and his heavily team-oriented career.
He’s become known as the “van man” around Dunedin, and it doesn’t appear to be a title he or his baseball club rejects.
It’s not a concern of the Blue Jays if Norris spends his off-season on the road in a cramped camper-van because he stays in shape and during the season, he plays well and holds up his contribution to the team, an assistant GM with the Jays told the National Post.
He is a promising prospect vying for a starting pitcher position with a left arm that can fire a fastball at 96 miles per hour.
The irony is his attempt at keeping his lifestyle simple is somewhat complicated by the immense publicity it’s garnered as of late.
But perhaps that’s part of the pitch for him making it as the team’s starter on the mound.
Cynics will say it’s all a publicity stunt, but I don’t believe it is; at least, not entirely.
In interviews, he comes off very down-to-earth and genuinely the lone, rugged ranger who understands the fascination with his unconventional lifestyle and people’s curiosity.
And in the arena of professional sports, where some of the most famous, highly paid and highly revered athletes make headlines for knocking out their wives, abusing their children, fighting dogs, doing hard drugs or any other bad thing you can imagine, this guy’s mountain-man lifestyle really is a breath of fresh air.
