Kid With The Best Job Ever Makes $1 Million Playing Call Of Duty

Chicago's Matt Haag is good at Call of Duty.

He's so good that he gets paid nearly a million dollars a year to play in tournaments and daily sessions watched by his 1.5 million YouTube subscribers.

Haag, or "Nadeshot" (from "grenade shot") as he's known to his fans, is contracted by Major League Gaming to live-stream his gaming activity on YouTube and MLG.com.

The 22-year-old also travels the world to play in front of packed arenas, and his sponsor, Red Bull, pays for all of his trips and training sessions.

When he isn't practicing, Haag is doing hour-long yoga sessions and having his brain hooked up to bundles of wires to make sure he is in tip-top shape, both mentally and physically.

This is quite the change considering he was flipping burgers at McDonald's just two years ago.

Haag first started playing in CoD tournaments when he was 15, and his uncle took him to play in his first live tournament two years later.

He came in fourth at the Anaheim, CA, competition but attracted the attention of Hector Rodriguez, the former insurance analyst who was building a team of gamers to be known as OpTic.

The team went to California after another two years for the CoD championships.

Haag came in first place, taking home $100,000.

But the tournaments aren't his primary source of income or fame.

It's the publicity he gets not only by live-streaming his gaming sessions but also by sharing his entire personal life through social media.

Haag's fans know all about him through his video diaries, and he makes sure to be as animated as possible when he plays.

Mike Rufail, the owner of rivals Team EnVyUs, says,

If you're talking about YouTube and fan outreach, he's the No. 1 player by far. But in terms of raw talent, he's a top 15 player — I wouldn't put him in that top three or four guys.

Haag has over 800,000 Twitter followers, and his YouTube channel is in the top 1 percent of most viewed.

Out of the $1 million he is projected to make by the end of 2014, about $700,000 will come from his videos.

Still, however, his biggest motivation is not winning money but keeping his growing fanbase entertained.

Citations: Nadeshot Becomes a Call of Duty Star (The New York Times)