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Draft day
Manu Ginóbili went 57th, Nikola Jokić 41st and Tom Brady 199th; Greg Oden and Anthony Bennett went first. What became of every NBA pick from 1980 to 2019 and every NFL player since 2000, the undrafted All-Pros, and the colleges and high schools the NBA drafted from.
By Austin · October 17, 2026
The draft is every team’s best guess about the future, and it’s right more often than not: the higher the pick, the longer and better the career, in both sports, almost without exception. The exceptions are the story. We followed every NBA pick from the 1980 to 2019 drafts and every NFL player who entered the league from 2000 to 2020, from the No. 1 picks to the players nobody picked at all.
| No. 1 or top ten | Late picks | Undrafted | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Basketball: careers of 10,000+ points | 65% of No. 1 picks | 3% of picks 46-60 who played | 3 of 806 players |
| Football: named All-Pro | 35% of top-ten picks | 46 picked 151st or later | 77 of 3,691 players |
Basketball
Of the 40 No. 1 picks from 1980 to 2019, 26 scored 10,000 points or more. The best of them, LeBron James, Shaquille O’Neal, Tim Duncan and Hakeem Olajuwon, are four of the best players ever. The worst are just as famous: Greg Oden’s knees limited him to three seasons, two of them in Portland, and Anthony Bennett scored 658 points in four. Some of the best late picks were playing abroad when they were drafted: Manu Ginóbili went 57th in 1999, Marc Gasol 48th in 2007, and Nikola Jokić 41st in 2014, announced during a commercial break.
| Pick | Played | 10,000+ points | Ten+ seasons | Avg. seasons | Best known |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| No. 1 | 40 of 40 | 26 | 30 | 12.5 | LeBron James, Kyrie Irving, Dwight Howard |
| 2-5 | 159 of 160 | 81 | 112 | 11.7 | Kevin Durant, Chris Paul, Russell Westbrook |
| 6-10 | 198 of 198 | 53 | 107 | 10.3 | Stephen Curry, Paul George, Damian Lillard |
| 11-20 | 397 of 399 | 57 | 173 | 8.4 | Giannis Antetokounmpo, Klay Thompson, Kawhi Leonard |
| 21-30 | 381 of 398 | 26 | 114 | 6.9 | Kyle Lowry, Jimmy Butler, Tony Parker |
| 31-45 | 483 of 596 | 16 | 88 | 5.1 | Nikola Jokic, Draymond Green, Khris Middleton |
| 46-60 | 308 of 535 | 10 | 39 | 4.2 | Paul Millsap, Marc Gasol, Manu Ginobili |
| 61 and later | 124 of 1,136 | 0 | 13 | 3.7 | Chris Dudley, Mark Eaton, Sedale Threatt |
| Undrafted | 806 | 3 | 56 | 3.4 | Ben Wallace, Avery Johnson, Garrett Temple |
The steals
Every 10,000-point career picked 41st or later, and the undrafted ones.
| Player | Drafted | Points |
|---|---|---|
| Manu Ginobili | No. 57, 1999 | 14,043 |
| Kyle Korver | No. 51, 2003 | 11,953 |
| Marc Gasol | No. 48, 2007 | 12,514 |
| Gerald Wilkins | No. 47, 1985 | 11,736 |
| Vernon Maxwell | No. 47, 1988 | 10,912 |
| Mo Williams | No. 47, 2003 | 10,759 |
| Paul Millsap | No. 47, 2006 | 14,536 |
| Jerome Kersey | No. 46, 1984 | 11,825 |
| Jeff Hornacek | No. 46, 1986 | 15,659 |
| Jordan Clarkson | No. 46, 2014 | 12,637 |
| Lou Williams | No. 45, 2005 | 15,593 |
| Goran Dragic | No. 45, 2008 | 12,568 |
| Michael Redd | No. 43, 2000 | 11,972 |
| Trevor Ariza | No. 43, 2004 | 11,593 |
| Stephen Jackson | No. 42, 1997 | 12,976 |
| Cuttino Mobley | No. 41, 1998 | 11,964 |
| Nikola Jokic | No. 41, 2014 | 18,009 |
| David Wesley | Undrafted | 11,842 |
| Wesley Matthews | Undrafted | 11,210 |
| John Starks | Undrafted | 10,829 |
No. 1 picks who didn’t last
| Player | Drafted | Seasons | Points |
|---|---|---|---|
| Anthony BennettCleveland Cavaliers | 2013 | 4 | 658 |
| Greg OdenPortland Trail Blazers | 2007 | 3 | 840 |
| Markelle FultzPhiladelphia 76ers | 2017 | 8 | 2,660 |
| Kwame BrownWashington Wizards | 2001 | 12 | 4,035 |
| Michael OlowokandiLos Angeles Clippers | 1998 | 9 | 4,135 |
Where they came from
Kentucky, Duke, UCLA and North Carolina produced the most NBA players, but the share of first-round picks from an American college fell for a decade from the mid-1990s. Kevin Garnett went straight from high school in 1995, Kobe Bryant in 1996 and LeBron James in 2003. In all, 43 players were drafted out of high school in these years, nearly all of them before the league began requiring players to be 19 and a year out of high school, with the 2006 draft. The players drafted from clubs abroad never went away.
| School | Players | 10,000+ points | Best known |
|---|---|---|---|
| Kentucky | 58 | 13 | Anthony Davis, Karl-Anthony Towns, John Wall |
| Duke | 57 | 12 | Kyrie Irving, Jayson Tatum, Grant Hill |
| UCLA | 52 | 7 | Russell Westbrook, Kevin Love, Jrue Holiday |
| North Carolina | 48 | 11 | Michael Jordan, Vince Carter, James Worthy |
| Kansas | 44 | 4 | Joel Embiid, Paul Pierce, Andrew Wiggins |
| Arizona | 41 | 8 | Andre Iguodala, Jason Terry, Richard Jefferson |
| Syracuse | 33 | 2 | Carmelo Anthony, Dan Schayes, Derrick Coleman |
| Louisville | 31 | 2 | Donovan Mitchell, Darrell Griffith, Felton Spencer |
| Michigan | 31 | 6 | Juwan Howard, Jamal Crawford, Glen Rice |
| Indiana | 28 | 3 | Isiah Thomas, Eric Gordon, Mike Woodson |
Football
Football’s draft runs seven rounds, and past the first hundred picks the odds of a star fall fast. But the players nobody drafted are a class of their own: 77 undrafted players who entered from 2000 to 2020 were named All-Pro, more than everyone picked 151st or later put together (46). Many were kickers, punters and long snappers, whom teams rarely spend a pick on, but not all: Antonio Gates went undrafted because he played basketball in college, James Harrison was cut four times before he became Defensive Player of the Year, and Jason Peters, Wes Welker and Cameron Wake all went unpicked. The most famous late pick of all is Tom Brady, the 199th in 2000.
| Pick | Players | All-Pros | Share | Avg. seasons | Best known |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Picks 1-10 | 210 | 74 | 35% | 9.2 | Trent Williams, Philip Rivers, Von Miller |
| 11-32 | 458 | 120 | 26% | 8.4 | Aaron Rodgers, Aaron Donald, Cameron Jordan |
| 33-64 | 666 | 86 | 13% | 7.2 | Bobby Wagner, Travis Kelce, Calais Campbell |
| 65-100 | 748 | 42 | 6% | 6.3 | Russell Wilson, Jason Witten, Keenan Allen |
| 101-150 | 990 | 50 | 5% | 5.5 | Kyle Juszczyk, Geno Atkins, Kirk Cousins |
| 151-200 | 917 | 32 | 3% | 4.9 | Tom Brady, Tyreek Hill, Jason Kelce |
| 201 and later | 899 | 14 | 2% | 4.2 | Antoine Bethea, Sam Koch, Jordan Poyer |
| Undrafted | 3,691 | 77 | 2% | 3.5 | Jason Peters, Morgan Cox, Johnny Hekker |
Late picks named All-Pro
| Player | Drafted |
|---|---|
| Tom Brady | No. 199, 2000 |
| Tyreek Hill | No. 165, 2016 |
| Jason Kelce | No. 191, 2011 |
| Andy Lee | No. 188, 2004 |
| Justin Bethel | No. 177, 2012 |
| Thomas Morstead | No. 164, 2009 |
| Jordan Poyer | No. 218, 2013 |
| Greg Zuerlein | No. 171, 2012 |
| Micah Hyde | No. 159, 2013 |
| Richard Sherman | No. 154, 2011 |
Undrafted All-Pros
Jason Peters (2004), Morgan Cox (2010), Johnny Hekker (2012), Antonio Gates (2003), Matt Prater (2006), Patrick Ricard (2017), Brett Kern (2008), James Harrison (2002), Cameron Wake (2005), Shaquil Barrett (2014), Wes Welker (2004), Tony Romo (2003).
Use it in Career Arc
A high pick’s career usually starts high and stays there; a late pick’s often starts at the bottom and climbs. In Career Arc, the shape of a rookie season says a lot about where a player came from. For the oldest first seasons of all, see the oldest rookies.
How we counted
Basketball: every pick in the 1980 to 2019 drafts. Our draft source is missing the 2014 draft, so that class comes from players’ own records, which have most of it but not all (Julius Randle is missing). A player is undrafted if he debuted from 1980 to 2020 and was never drafted. Careers are measured by seasons played and official career points, not honors. Football: every player who entered the league from 2000 to 2020 and played at least one season on a team, not just training camp or the practice squad. Our roster files give the pick number but not the round, and compensatory picks move the round lines every year, so football is grouped by pick number. All-Pro means named to an All-Pro team at least once. We don’t have where football players went to college before 2015, so football has no college table.
About the data
Draft data: the NBA’s draft history and player records; nflverse’s roster files. Seasons come from the rosters behind Teammate Chain, career points from the NBA’s official totals. Spot a mistake? Let us know.