1989 NBA draft

Despite eight of the top ten picks being considered busts, including the first two picks Pervis Ellison and Danny Ferry, the draft produced many talented players such as Shawn Kemp, Glen Rice, Sean Elliott, Nick Anderson, Dana Barros, Tim Hardaway, Vlade Divac, Clifford Robinson, B. J. Armstrong and Mookie Blaylock.

In addition to that, this would also be the first year where an international player would be considered a direct underclassman to participate in an NBA draft, with Vlade Divac from the KK Partizan Belgrade of the Eastern Bloc nation known as SFR Yugoslavia (now since separated, with Divac representing Serbia) being the first ever international underclassman to be taken directly from an overseas team without previously going to an American college or playing for any prior American institution.

Including those two players and Andrew Gaze, who had previously played in Australia for multiple years before playing only one season at Seton Hall University while being over the age of 22 by that time, the number of underclassmen would officially be considered a grand total of fourteen players instead of eleven (or twelve including Gaze).

[7] This would be the fourth year in a row with at least one player that previously played in college entering the NBA draft as an underclassman.

It was also the second year in a row where a player would qualify as an eligible underclassman for the NBA draft while previously playing for a French-based team in order to do so.