Handicapping Your MBA Odds: Ms. Nielsen’s, Mr. Coca-Cola, Ms. Payday Loans, Mr. CPA, Ms. Naval Academy, Dr. Baseball

Dr. Baseball

720 GMAT

3.9 GPA

Undergraduate degree in pre-med and currently attending a top medical school (think Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Columbia, Hopkins)

Plans on applying to business school after my third year of medical school

Work experience includes one year as a research coordinator at an Ivy League medical school department and three years as a professional baseball player

“Was taken in the Major League Baseball draft out of college my junior year. Played for three seasons while finishing school in the off-season and applied to medical schools”

Extracurricular involvement as a division one varsity athlete, volunteer for a handicapped baseball league, author of multiple medical articles in scientific journals

“Interested in healthcare management (academic administration). Want to improve the efficacy and distribution of care through targeted management strategies”

26-year-old white male

Odds of Success:

Harvard: 30% to 40%

MIT: 40% to 50%

Columbia: 50%+

Yale: 50%+

Wharton: 50%+

Dartmouth: 50%+

Stanford: 20% to 30%

Sandy’s Analysis: Well, you have a really nice story. Typically, at Harvard Business School and Stanford, medical student dual career kids from other med schools-versus kids already at HMS or SMS–are judged by quality of med school and such intangibles as goals and special circumstances. Most med school applicants to B-school already have solid GPAs and standardized testing scores because, duh, they got into med school.

You are OK in that department, especially since you’re going to one of the best med schools in the world. If we take major league sports out of the picture, you are in good shape because your health care management goals also seem tied into your research and to some degree to your work experience. In applying, you need to create that connection as much as possible.

If that was ALL we had, I’d say chances at Stanford were remote, not enough super duper stats and prestige and no X factor, and I’d say chances at HBS were possible, they take kids with this profile and ding them, it would depend on how well you presented your dog and pony show, etc. (it is also possible that some bigwigs in your med school job could go to bat).

Not sure what the MLB adds, but it sure adds something. Most adcoms are jock-sniffers of some sort and managing a pro career and undergrad and med school applications is a real substantive accomplishment. Will it tilt things at Stanford, dunno? The idea of pro-athlete amid their PC- nerd, prestige student body could be hard to resist.

You should get into HBS, if your application has serviceable execution and you don’t blow the interview. Same logic as Stanford they just got more room.

Other places you mention should be doable if you can convince them that they are your first or near first choice.