To the Editors of the Yale Daily News:

As a former non-varsity athlete undergraduate — and retired physician — I was initially somewhat outraged reading about the preferential medical treatment of varsity athletes at Yale. But while I am not sure that the current system is totally fair to non-athletes, I think some argument can be made for the system that has evolved. Having lived with two varsity athletes — swimming, baseball — in Davenport College, I recognize that varsity sports are a time commitment likely beyond any other extracurricular activity at Yale. I had two rehearsals a week in Keith Wilson’s concert band, and one, or often two science labs a week, but I don’t feel that this compares to sports practices and competitions, and especially so when travel is required for the latter. Furthermore, while some of my fellow students in chemistry lab seemed a bit dangerous with their flaming ether balls rolling over at me across the lab bench, I was not subject to the many injuries that occur in the course of playing sports at a serious level.

Another factor is the current financial environment in college sports against which our coaches are recruiting. Look at Danny Wolf who transferred to Michigan, a very good school, last year. He gets an athletic scholarship, potentially a bucket of NIL money and great exposure on national TV for a possible NBA career. Yale offers none of the above except for a rare ESPN2 televising of the Harvard football game or the Ivy basketball tournament. If our teams are to remain competitive, assuming this is a  goal as our teams are relatively competitive at this point for the most part, our coaches need to have some small bit of a carrot/incentive to compete with the Dukes, Stanfords, UVAs, Michigans, etc. that are academically competitive and offer these perks. The solution may be to buff up the care that non-athletes get, in terms of access, attention by physicians, necessary referrals, etc.

David J. Stone MD

Davenport ’74