Small Forward - OG Anunoby, No. 23 pick in 2017
It is hard to predict when injuries will have an outsized impact on a player's draft stock. Joel Embiid fell from first to third in his draft after an injury prevented him from doing most draft workouts. Nerlens Noel was the presumptive No. 1 pick but dropped due to a torn ACL in college. Michael Porter Jr. dropped from the Top-5 to the late lottery due to back issues; he has outperformed his draft slot, but also struggled with a bad back throughout his career.
OG Anunoby is a fascinating case in how an injury can affect draft stock. Anunoby was considered to be a mid-to-late first round prospect heading into his sophomore season at Indiana in 2016-17; he then played extremely well over the first few months of the season, rising into the late lottery.
Anunoby then suffered a season-ending knee injury in late January that saw him plummet on most draft boards into the late first or even early second. On draft night the Raptors then struck with the 23rd pick as Anunoby's draft stock came full circle.
The 2017 NBA Draft was a loaded one, but Anunoby was clearly not drafted highly enough. He was able to return quickly enough to play in 74 games his rookie season and quickly developed into one of the best perimeter defenders in the NBA. His offensive game came around not long after, and now in his seventh season Anunoby is one of the premier 3-and-D players in the entire NBA.
Teams that took Donovan Mitchell, Bam Adebayo or even Jarrett Allen ahead of Anunoby probably aren't feeling ashamed, but Justin Jackson, Justin Patton, D.J. Wilson, T.J. Leaf and Terrance Ferguson all went in the 10 picks before Anunoby.
Interestingly enough, so did Harry Giles, who was a top-5 prospect heading into his senior year of high school before a significant knee injury tanked his draft stock; that injury would stick with him and he would never develop into a rotation player in the NBA. OG bounced back; Giles did not. Sometimes taking a risk in the draft is a step into the unknown.