The Toronto Raptors’ cookie didn’t crumble the way the team would have hoped at the NBA Draft Lottery, sliding down two spots and landing with the ninth overall pick.

So, yes, all the Cooper Flagg Raptors fan edits and jersey swaps have to be thrown away, but that doesn’t mean Toronto can’t land an impact player just inside the top 10. There’s more than one good player, and the draft is far from a perfect process. When looking back at history, there is numerous great players and even MVP’s who have fallen out of the lottery ( Giannis Antetokounmpo ) and even out of the first round (Nikola Jokic).

Raptors President Masai Ujiri was calm, cool, and collected following the lottery, understanding that it was just that – a lottery.

“When you go into these things, just everything that comes out at you — hey, this is luck. It’s a lottery,” said Ujiri after the lottery just off the stage in a ballroom turned into a TV set.

“It can go every way. You put yourself in position to think every single way. But before it happens, most of it is you hope … you just hope that you get it (the No.1 pick). I’m one of those people, people that when these kind of things come, I’ve just been through so much, there’s no high or low. I know exactly how to feel . Honestly, it doesn’t (change anything). We have all our picks going forward. I think we continue this rebuild and grow as a team. And honestly, I’m as optimistic as I was earlier,” Ujiri said.

“You hope and pray that you, you get a No. 1 or No. 2 or you jump. (But) if there’s one thing I’m confident about, it’s us picking in the draft. I’m very, very confident. This draft is a good draft. From three to about 12, it’s who you like or how you like it. So we’ll figure out how we like it and how to manoeuvre.”

Toronto’s history with the ninth overall pick is encouraging, and it could instill some optimism in the Raptors faithful, as no matter which front office has selected at No. 9, they have made good selections.

In the 30 years the Raptors have been around, Toronto has selected in the ninth slot three times, that’s 10 percent of the time. If you take out the three years the Raptors didn’t have any selections in 2007, 2013, and 2018, that percentage goes up even more. Those three players they selected all made an impact on the team and turned out to be good or even great players in Tracy McGrady, DeMar DeRozan, and Jakob Poeltl.

McGrady would develop into a Hall of Famer, though not with Toronto, but with the Orlando Magic and Houston Rockets. McGrady would join Tim Duncan and Chauncey Billups as the only members of that class to be inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame.

12 years later, Canada’s team would land at No.9 again in 2009 and select DeRozan. The six-time all-star spent nearly a decade north of the border as his impact went beyond the basketball court.

In 2016, the last time Toronto picked at nine was Poeltl. While maybe not as decorated as the previous two, the Austrian seven-footer seemingly is remaining in Toronto’s plans and has flirted as a top 10 centre in the association.

Some fantastic players have been taken in the nine-hole throughout NBA history as well, none better than Dirk Nowitzki. The German big man was taken in the 1998 draft, eventually becoming a 14-time All-Star, league MVP, and NBA champion with the Dallas Mavericks.

In 1999 and 2002, the Suns took a pair of multi-time all-stars at pick nine in Shawn Marion and Amar’e Stoudemire. The former was a four-time All-Star who later won a title with Dallas, while the latter went on to claim six All-Star appearances and the Rookie of the Year award.

Finals MVP Andre Igoudala (2004), Defensive Player of the Year and two-time All-Star Joakim Noah (2007, and the Charlotte Hornets’ all-time leading scorer and four-time All-Star Kemba Walker (2011) also highlight some of the best players to come from the ninth overall pick.

Overall, it’s been pretty even over the last two decades of the ninth overall pick developing into an All-Star, a starter/rotation guy, or a bust. Between 2002-2022, there have been 21 players selected, six have become All-Stars (28.6 percent), eight have become long-term starters or rotation guys (38.1 percent), and seven have become busts (33.3 percent).

Well, how about the ninth pick over just the last decade? It’s been a little less impressive than the former stars previously mentioned, but it paints a picture of a median outcome and the most realistic case for the selection.

Back to the Raptors, where under Masai Ujiri, Toronto’s history of selecting in the entire first round has been pretty solid as well.

Ujiri’s only true misses in the first round have been in 2014 with Caboclo, the executive’s first season on the job with Toronto, and in 2020 with Flynn, the “COVID” class.

Overall, the Raptors have hit every time they have picked at nine, while there have been some stars drafted at the specific pick. Though in the last decade, no one selected has made an All-Star team. With potential names like Derik Queen , Khaman Maluach , Carter Bryant , Kasparas Jakucionis , and others all potentially available, it remains to be seen who the Toronto Raptors pick, and how they turn out.