Pettis’ Interests Go Way Beyond Football
November 16, 2017 | Football
By Rich Myhre
If you follow the University of Washington football team, then you already know about Dante Pettis, the Huskies' dynamic senior wide receiver and record-setting punt returner.
But now let's meet Dante Pettis off the field. He is, as you soon discover, a thoughtful and engaging young man with multiple interests beyond football. Among them are three pastimes he finds particularly special - literature, poetry and photography.
Years ago, he explains, the writing of F. Scott Fitzgerald and specifically the novel "The Great Gatsby" opened his eyes to the power and poignancy of the written word. He is similarly awed by the soaring elegance of Shakespearean prose. And he savors opportunities to go off with his camera in search of photographs that are visually striking and emotionally stirring.
Indeed, a few minutes with Pettis is enough time to understand that football is just one of many loves.
"He's got a lot of interests … and he's unique that way," said UW offensive coordinator Jonathan Smith. "Over the years I've been able to talk to him and he's fun to be around.
"He's a good, well-rounded young man," Smith added, "and that's a credit to his parents."
Of Pettis's many passions, few surpass his enjoyment of reading. In moments of leisure, and with a good book in hand, "you kind of get put into that world and everything (in real life) goes away," he said.
In his elementary school years, and without being coerced by his parents or a teacher, Pettis often curled up with a good book. Indeed, his love of reading made him rather unique among the other kids in his neighborhood (OK, he also loved video games, so maybe he wasn't all that unusual).
"I was a big reader when I was younger," he said. "Up until sixth grade I was reading all the time. And I'd write stories, too. … But from sixth grade to my sophomore year of high school I kind of stopped reading and writing.
"Then in my junior year we read 'The Great Gatsby' in school and I was like, 'This is awesome.' And in my senior year I was in a Shakespeare class and (my love of literature) really took off."
Pettis lives in San Clemente, Calif., and attended Junipero Serra Catholic High School in nearby San Juan Capistrano. He enrolled at Washington as part of head coach Chris Petersen's first class of recruits in 2014.
When Pettis considered his academic options as an incoming freshman, he was thinking of physical therapy as a post-football career. But that program is not offered at Washington, so he decided a biology degree might point him in the right direction.
Alas, it did not go well. "It was rough," he recalled. "It was hard to keep up with the class schedule, the tests were extremely hard, and I wasn't doing as well as I should have. So I was like, 'OK, let me rethink this.'"
He ended up conferring with academic advisors who asked about his interests. He mentioned reading and writing, and they suggested an English degree.
Just like that, Pettis was an English major with a creative writing emphasis. He believes he has been the only English major on the football team throughout his four years at Washington.
As it turned out, his choice of majors took a few people by surprise. One of the early skeptics was his father, Gary Pettis, third base coach for the world champion Houston Astros baseball team.
"My dad said, 'What are you going to do with an English degree?' I said, 'I don't know. I have absolutely no idea what I'll do with an English degree.' But I'm extremely interested in it, and I'd rather do something that I'm really interested in and do it well than fight as hard as I can in biology and barely scrape by."
Right from the start, English classes were a good fit for Pettis. Yes, the weekly regimen of instruction and studying demands a lot of time and effort, but for him it has truly been, as the saying goes, a labor of love.
And although Pettis has to read several books a year for his major, he still finds time to read for his own enjoyment. He estimates that he reads about 15 books a year, maybe more. And in the summer, when he is free from the constraints of school and football, he reads "all the time."
He particularly enjoys coming-of-age books, but has also developed a newfound appreciation for many of literature's classic novels.
In recent years he fell in love with "The Alchemist," a novel by Brazilian author Paulo Coelho. It is the story of a boy from Spain who has a recurring dream of treasure, and later a fortune teller confirms that he will find a great treasure in Egypt. So the boy sets off on his long journey, and along the way meets with friendship, love, disappointment and, ultimately, fulfillment.
And if Pettis should happen to be marooned on some faraway tropical island for the rest of his life, he would of course hope to have favorite books for company. For starters, he would want The Bible, and then that old beloved friend, "The Great Gatsby." Three other books he'd also like along would be "The Perks of Being a Wallflower" by Stephen Chbosky, "By the River Piedra I Saw Down and Wept" also by Paulo Coelho, and "Me and Earl and the Dying Girl" by Jesse Andrews.
His tastes in poetry begin with Malanda Jean-Claude, who writes about the progression from boyhood to manhood in "Because of a Woman." Other favored poets are Rudy Francisco, R.H. Sin, Lang Leav and Edgar Allan Poe, with the latter having penned such classics as "The Raven" and "Annabel Lee."
When Pettis goes off on a vacation, he likes to take with him at least two books, sometimes more. But he also packs his camera, a Canon EOS 70D, knowing that at some point he will head out to snap some photos.
"I love photography, and I'm having a lot of fun with it," he said. "When I'm on vacation I'll be reading, and then I'm like, 'OK, now I really want to go take pictures.' And then I'll be out taking pictures and I'll think, 'Oh, I wish I was reading right now.'"
When it comes to photography, his special interest is nature. "I love animals," he said. "The big cats. … If I could go out and take pictures of some of the animals I'm obsessed with, I don't see how I could be any happier than doing that."
And when he isn't taking pictures himself, he loves admiring the work of other photographers, particularly nature photographers like Steve Winter, Frans Lanting, Hannes Becker, Juan Oliphant and Mike Coots.
Pettis will complete his college football career this season, and he then hopes to play professionally in the years to come. He is still open to owning a physical therapy clinic in the future, but he also wants to further his writing career.
"I'd love to write books and stories for movies," he said. "I don't know if I could do the whole script, but I'd definitely like to come up with the story and kind of pitch it for movies."
The entertainment industry has a natural appeal for Pettis since his brother, Kyler Pettis, is an actor who portrays the character Theo Carver on the daytime drama "Days of Our Lives."
For Dante Pettis, acting could also be an intriguing career option. Though he has never acted himself, "I think it'd be something that'd be extremely fun. I'd love to do it. It'd just take a little bit of work," he said.
"My brother always says, 'Anybody can act. It just takes time if you're patient enough to learn how to do it.' I'd just have to put the work in for that."
Succeeding in the entertainment industry is about talent, yes, but also about connections, and Pettis also has an uncle in the business.
"Not that you have to know somebody (to succeed), but it helps," he said. "It speeds up the process. It makes it easier to get the auditions and easier for them to look at your work. … So hopefully I can get some good connections going."
As for his post-football dream job, "I think the one that will probably take a back seat is physical therapy," Pettis said. "I want to do it, but I could see myself having trouble forcing myself to go back to school for that. The other ones, you can get lucky and meet someone, and you don't really have to do any other school for that.
"I have such a big love for art in general," he said, "and I don't really think the movies or the writing takes the forefront over photography. My love for art is there."
If you follow the University of Washington football team, then you already know about Dante Pettis, the Huskies' dynamic senior wide receiver and record-setting punt returner.
But now let's meet Dante Pettis off the field. He is, as you soon discover, a thoughtful and engaging young man with multiple interests beyond football. Among them are three pastimes he finds particularly special - literature, poetry and photography.
Years ago, he explains, the writing of F. Scott Fitzgerald and specifically the novel "The Great Gatsby" opened his eyes to the power and poignancy of the written word. He is similarly awed by the soaring elegance of Shakespearean prose. And he savors opportunities to go off with his camera in search of photographs that are visually striking and emotionally stirring.
Indeed, a few minutes with Pettis is enough time to understand that football is just one of many loves.
"He's got a lot of interests … and he's unique that way," said UW offensive coordinator Jonathan Smith. "Over the years I've been able to talk to him and he's fun to be around.
"He's a good, well-rounded young man," Smith added, "and that's a credit to his parents."
Of Pettis's many passions, few surpass his enjoyment of reading. In moments of leisure, and with a good book in hand, "you kind of get put into that world and everything (in real life) goes away," he said.
In his elementary school years, and without being coerced by his parents or a teacher, Pettis often curled up with a good book. Indeed, his love of reading made him rather unique among the other kids in his neighborhood (OK, he also loved video games, so maybe he wasn't all that unusual).
"I was a big reader when I was younger," he said. "Up until sixth grade I was reading all the time. And I'd write stories, too. … But from sixth grade to my sophomore year of high school I kind of stopped reading and writing.
"Then in my junior year we read 'The Great Gatsby' in school and I was like, 'This is awesome.' And in my senior year I was in a Shakespeare class and (my love of literature) really took off."
Pettis lives in San Clemente, Calif., and attended Junipero Serra Catholic High School in nearby San Juan Capistrano. He enrolled at Washington as part of head coach Chris Petersen's first class of recruits in 2014.
When Pettis considered his academic options as an incoming freshman, he was thinking of physical therapy as a post-football career. But that program is not offered at Washington, so he decided a biology degree might point him in the right direction.
Alas, it did not go well. "It was rough," he recalled. "It was hard to keep up with the class schedule, the tests were extremely hard, and I wasn't doing as well as I should have. So I was like, 'OK, let me rethink this.'"
He ended up conferring with academic advisors who asked about his interests. He mentioned reading and writing, and they suggested an English degree.
Just like that, Pettis was an English major with a creative writing emphasis. He believes he has been the only English major on the football team throughout his four years at Washington.
As it turned out, his choice of majors took a few people by surprise. One of the early skeptics was his father, Gary Pettis, third base coach for the world champion Houston Astros baseball team.
"My dad said, 'What are you going to do with an English degree?' I said, 'I don't know. I have absolutely no idea what I'll do with an English degree.' But I'm extremely interested in it, and I'd rather do something that I'm really interested in and do it well than fight as hard as I can in biology and barely scrape by."
Right from the start, English classes were a good fit for Pettis. Yes, the weekly regimen of instruction and studying demands a lot of time and effort, but for him it has truly been, as the saying goes, a labor of love.
And although Pettis has to read several books a year for his major, he still finds time to read for his own enjoyment. He estimates that he reads about 15 books a year, maybe more. And in the summer, when he is free from the constraints of school and football, he reads "all the time."
He particularly enjoys coming-of-age books, but has also developed a newfound appreciation for many of literature's classic novels.
In recent years he fell in love with "The Alchemist," a novel by Brazilian author Paulo Coelho. It is the story of a boy from Spain who has a recurring dream of treasure, and later a fortune teller confirms that he will find a great treasure in Egypt. So the boy sets off on his long journey, and along the way meets with friendship, love, disappointment and, ultimately, fulfillment.
And if Pettis should happen to be marooned on some faraway tropical island for the rest of his life, he would of course hope to have favorite books for company. For starters, he would want The Bible, and then that old beloved friend, "The Great Gatsby." Three other books he'd also like along would be "The Perks of Being a Wallflower" by Stephen Chbosky, "By the River Piedra I Saw Down and Wept" also by Paulo Coelho, and "Me and Earl and the Dying Girl" by Jesse Andrews.
His tastes in poetry begin with Malanda Jean-Claude, who writes about the progression from boyhood to manhood in "Because of a Woman." Other favored poets are Rudy Francisco, R.H. Sin, Lang Leav and Edgar Allan Poe, with the latter having penned such classics as "The Raven" and "Annabel Lee."
When Pettis goes off on a vacation, he likes to take with him at least two books, sometimes more. But he also packs his camera, a Canon EOS 70D, knowing that at some point he will head out to snap some photos.
"I love photography, and I'm having a lot of fun with it," he said. "When I'm on vacation I'll be reading, and then I'm like, 'OK, now I really want to go take pictures.' And then I'll be out taking pictures and I'll think, 'Oh, I wish I was reading right now.'"
When it comes to photography, his special interest is nature. "I love animals," he said. "The big cats. … If I could go out and take pictures of some of the animals I'm obsessed with, I don't see how I could be any happier than doing that."
And when he isn't taking pictures himself, he loves admiring the work of other photographers, particularly nature photographers like Steve Winter, Frans Lanting, Hannes Becker, Juan Oliphant and Mike Coots.
Pettis will complete his college football career this season, and he then hopes to play professionally in the years to come. He is still open to owning a physical therapy clinic in the future, but he also wants to further his writing career.
"I'd love to write books and stories for movies," he said. "I don't know if I could do the whole script, but I'd definitely like to come up with the story and kind of pitch it for movies."
The entertainment industry has a natural appeal for Pettis since his brother, Kyler Pettis, is an actor who portrays the character Theo Carver on the daytime drama "Days of Our Lives."
For Dante Pettis, acting could also be an intriguing career option. Though he has never acted himself, "I think it'd be something that'd be extremely fun. I'd love to do it. It'd just take a little bit of work," he said.
"My brother always says, 'Anybody can act. It just takes time if you're patient enough to learn how to do it.' I'd just have to put the work in for that."
Succeeding in the entertainment industry is about talent, yes, but also about connections, and Pettis also has an uncle in the business.
"Not that you have to know somebody (to succeed), but it helps," he said. "It speeds up the process. It makes it easier to get the auditions and easier for them to look at your work. … So hopefully I can get some good connections going."
As for his post-football dream job, "I think the one that will probably take a back seat is physical therapy," Pettis said. "I want to do it, but I could see myself having trouble forcing myself to go back to school for that. The other ones, you can get lucky and meet someone, and you don't really have to do any other school for that.
"I have such a big love for art in general," he said, "and I don't really think the movies or the writing takes the forefront over photography. My love for art is there."
| Dante Pettis's Top Five Books |
| 1. The Bible |
| 2. The Great Gatsby |
| 3. Perks of Being a Wallflower |
| 4. By The River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept |
| 5. Me and Earl and the Dying Girl |
| Dante Pettis's Top Five Poets |
| 1. Malanda Jean-Claude |
| 2. Rudy Francisco |
| 3. R. H. Sin |
| 4. Lang Leav |
| 5. Edgar Allan Poe |
| Dante Pettis's Top Five Photographers |
| 1. Steve Winter |
| 2. Frans Lanting |
| 3. Hannes Becker |
| 4. Juan Oliphant |
| 5. Mike Coots |
| Dante Pettis's Top Five Movies |
| 1. Remember the Titans |
| 2. Me and Earl and the Dying Girl |
| 3. Stuck in Love |
| 4. Peter Pan |
| 5. The entire Harry Potter series |
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