A Series of Fortunate Events: Looking Back on the Curious Career of Robert Horry
You can’t win seven NBA championships without a little luck. Or can you?
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The modern NBA is a meteor: hot, fast-moving, and always threatening to blow up social media. This summer alone, LABron James shook up the world like a SoCal earthquake, Demarcus Cousins became the most despised mercenary in sports, and a few dozen teenagers are hitting the Vegas strip to prove their million-dollar salaries were worth the investment. There’s no better time to be a basketball fan.
So while we’re at it, let’s talk about a guy close to celebrating the 10th anniversary of his retirement and one of my favorite players of his generation. A cold-blooded, clutch killer who will forever go down in basketball lore. Seven NBA Championships. Zero All-Star appearances. Zero significant individual awards.
Let’s talk about the amazing life and career of Big Shot Bob himself, Mr. Robert Horry.
Horry was born on August 20th, 1970 in Hartford County, Maryland. After his parents divorced, he moved with his mother and brother to Covington County Alabama, where he played basketball at Andalusia High School. Horry was a standout, winning the Alabama High School Basketball Player of the Year award during his senior year. He was also named Fourth Team Parade All-American, along with another Robert — future Duke floor general and Arizona State head coach Bobby Hurley.
Following his high school success, Horry earned a scholarship to play at Alabama. An All-SEC performer, he played alongside All-American James Robinson and eventual NBA All-Star Latrell Sprewell on a team which would win three SEC Championships and reach the 1991 Sweet Sixteen.
During his time in Tuscaloosa, Horry set his first eyebrow-raising record (I will dub thee “Odd Bob Record”), registering 286 career blocks — a school-best to this day. For the lovers of more obscure statistics, Horry hoisted up 28 field goal attempts in a 1992 game against Ole Miss, the most by any Alabama player since the 1970’s. As the Alabama record books show, dudes on Tide hoops teams really loved to let it fly back in the day.
Turning to the NBA chapter of Robert Horry’s life, the forward’s career began to develop in an unbelievably fortunate way. Selected 11th overall by the Houston Rockets in the 1992 NBA draft, Horry and company comprised a mostly forgettable draft class. Aside from top picks Shaquille O’Neal and Alonzo Mourning (good work scouts), the 1992 draft generated only six combined All-Star appearances from the players picked after the first two selections. In Horry’s case, the Rockets nailed his 11th overall pick; Horry’s 7.0 career points per game register lower than 9 of the 10 players picked ahead of him (good work scouts).
7.0 PPG isn’t all that impressive, but legacy is all about contributing when it counts. And in Horry’s career, it was also the where it counts that made Big Shot Bob so legendary. Had a 1994 trade to Detroit never fallen through due to Sean Elliott’s failed physical, this might have been a different story. Because it all started in Houston.
It’s June, 1994. Horry, donning one of the most underrated ‘90s jerseys, has just broken my father’s heart, beating the New York Knicks in seven games to win the NBA Finals. While he didn’t hit any big shots, Horry did average 10.3 points, 5.7 rebounds and 3.7 assists per game to propel his Rockets to victory. He also got some help from some Nigerian guy Hakeem Olajuwon.
For most players, an NBA championship represents the pinnacle of a career. Never satisfied, however, NBA champion Horry was back in the postseason just one year later. Coming off a rough final 8 games of the regular season, during which he shot 6-of-28 (.214) from downtown, Horry turned it around in the playoffs by averaging a cool 12.8 PPG and shooting 38.7 percent from three. Even more impressively, Horry finally earned his Big Shot moniker by providing the Rockets with some clutch service on multiple occasions.
Big Shot 1.0: In Game 1 of the Western Conference Finals against the San Antonio Spurs, Horry hit a jumper from just inside the arc with 6.5 seconds to put his team ahead for good. Despite having made no field goals prior to this moment. Talk about huevos.
Big Shot 2.0: Cut to the NBA finals, and two-pointers were no longer enough for Robert Horry. To lift the Rockets over the Magic in Game 3, Horry nailed a dagger three with 16.5 second left, sealing Houston’s 106–103 victory and putting the Rockets up 3–0. in the series.
Houston ended up finishing off the sweep of Shaq’s Magic in Game 4, winning the NBA Championship as a lowly 6 seed. Perhaps even more impressively, Horry set another Odd Bob Record by snatching a finals record seven steals in Game 1. And to think Hakeem was the Defensive Player of the Year that season.
In 1995–96, Horry registered the best statistical season of his career, setting personal bests in points, assists, blocks and minutes per game. But who cares about that? Clearly Houston didn’t, because H-Town shipped Bobby to the Phoenix Suns in a blockbuster deal after getting bounced in the second round of the playoffs. I’d put most of the blame for Houston’s woes on the change in jerseys.
Despite having gained a two-time NBA champion, Phoenix started off the 1996–1997 season with an abysmal 13 straight losses. Just when things finally seemed to be crashing back down to earth for Horry, the Suns traded the forward to the Lakers. Paired with a new set of future hall-of-fame teamates — Shaquille O’Neal and an 18-year-old kid named Kobe Bean Bryant — the Lake Show plus Horry lost to the Jazz in the second round of the playoffs. This time however, Rob stuck around. Enter the next chapter of Horry’s illustrious career.
Two years later, and Horry’s Lakers have been bounced from the playoffs early in each of the previous two seasons. So Horry decided to do what he did best: win.
You know this part of the story. Stuck behind NBA ironman A.C. Green during the 1999-2000 campaign, Rob came off the bench for a good chunk of the playoffs. After missing 11 of 12 threes in the first five games of the finals, Horry dialed it in for Game 6 in the way that only Big Shot Bob could. Nailing 66 percent of his threes that game (2-of-3 shooting), Horry helped propel the Lakers to a series-clinching victory. Horry had now won his third NBA title, a feat which would take future Laker LeBron James another 16 years to achieve.
In the 2001 playoffs, Horry again played super-sub for Los Angeles. This time, however, Big Shot Bob took the reigns. For at least one game, that is.
Big Shot 3.0: In front of a hostile Philly crowd for Game 3 of the NBA Finals, Robert Horry dropped 15 points (the most by a non-HOFer in the game) on 3–3 three-point shooting to put the Lakers ahead 2–1 in the series. The most important of the shots came late in the 4th quarter, when Horry’s corner trey stretched the purple-and-gold lead to 4 with 47.2 seconds left in the ball game.
The Lakers would go on to win the series 4–1, despite having lost Tyron Lue’s reputation to a brutal Allen Iverson step-back in Game 1. Robert Horry had just entered even more rare air, having been crowned an NBA Champion for the fourth time. But the story was hardly over.
Big Shot 4.0: Good things continued to come in threes for Rob in the 2002 playoffs. Against the Blazers in Game 3 of the first-round, Horry started off shooting 0-of-3 from deep. With 3 seconds to go, Bryant passed (?) to Big Shot Bob in front of the Portland bench, who sent home the game-winning three-pointer to complete a 3 game sweep of Portland. It was awesome. Yet not quite as awesome as…
Big Shot 5.0: …Horry’s game-winning buzzer-beater in Game 4 of the Western Conference Finals against the Kings. Kobe couldn’t tie the game with a layup. Shaq couldn’t do it with a put back. But after a fortunate slap from Vlade Divac delivered the ball right to Horry at the top of the key, Big Shot splashed it home. The clutch play tied up the series, helping the Lakers overcome a stingy Kings roster and advance to their third-straight finals.
Which, by the way, Los Angeles won. Five trophies. 10 seasons. Was Robert Horry’s magical run ever going to end?
In 2003, Big Shot Bob and the Lake Show hit a rough chapter in their storybook. Remember when the Lakers couldn’t make it to the finals in Horry’s first 3 years in LA? That was partially due to a menace out in Texas known as the Spurs.
In 1998, Tim Duncan and the Spurs swept the Lakers in the second round of the Western Conference playoffs, and ended up releasing the NBA from Michael Jordan’s stranglehold upon the championship trophy (held only by the Bulls and Horry’s Rocket’s since 1991). In the next three championship years, however, the Lakers exacted their revenge to the tune of a combined 8 to 1 drubbing of the Spurs in two playoff series.
Anyway, back to the bump; in the second round of the 2003 playoffs, the Lakers looked poised to shoot down the Spurs on the back of another Big Shot. In a pivotal Game 5, Horry had the ball in his hands with seconds to go, ready to sink another game-winner and send the series back to LA with a 3–2 lead.
But he missed it. If you’re gonna watch none of my other hyperlinks, watch this one. It was SO close to being another legendary shot. Play-by-play man Marv Albert sounded like he was jumping out of his chair with excitement when the ball was in the air. The Spurs took the series in six games, and won their second championship.
72 days after that miss, Horry signed a multi-year deal with the Spurs, setting the model for certain future superstars to follow. A change of scenery did little to quell the forward’s championship drought, as the Spurs failed to make it past the second round of the playoffs in Horry’s debut year.
That loss came at the hands of none other than the Lakers. Worst off all, the biggest shot of that series belonged to a former teammate of Horry’s, Derek Fisher. The 34-year-old Horry had seen better days; in 2003-’04, he set a career-low in points, rebounds, assists, blocks and steals per game. Horry probably could have called it quits that offseason. 5 championships was nothing to scoff at. But the NBA had yet to see the last of Big Shot Bob.
Cut to the 2005 playoffs. Horry is coming off a much better regular season then the year before, scoring double digit points 15 times and seeing minutes in 75 games.
In the postseason, however, Horry posted 11 such games in his 23 playoff appearances. This included a 21-point performance in Game 5 of the Finals against the defending champion Pistons. Knowing the Spurs needed everything they could to break a 2–2 tie, Horry went bonkers in clutch time. After only hitting one three in the closing seconds of the third quarter, he scored 18 points in the 4th quarter and overtime. He had a stretch where he scored 7 points in 58 seconds.
Read into the box score at your own discretion. Teammate Tim Duncan had 26 points and 19 rebounds, an outstanding game. It doesn’t show that he missed a potential game-winning put back at the end of regulation, or how he only hit 1-of-5 free throws in the 4th quarter, or how he committed a massive turnover with a minute to go in overtime. Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili were lukewarm at best, scoring 14 and 15, respectively. But they didn’t hit any threes, going a combined 0-of-7.
Big Shot 6.0: All this proves is, at least in terms of scoring, Robert Horry unequivocally carried the Spurs to an overtime win at the age of 34. His 19th, 20th, and 21st points came in one of his most memorable big shots, his fifth three-pointer of the night, that put the Spurs in front with 6 seconds remaining. Ice. In. His. Veins.
Propelled by Horry’s heroics, the Spurs completed their victory over the Pistons in seven games. Once again, Robert Horry was an NBA champion. And with six rings, Horry had tied Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippin, Kareem Abdul-Jabar and Bob Cousy, etching his name among some of the sport’s all-time greats.
The story of Big Shots Bob’s seventh ring does not focus on a clutch shot. Nevertheless, it’s the final, eyebrow-raising page in Horry’s fascinating story.
After getting bounced in the second round in 2006 by Steve Nash and the seven-seconds-or-less Suns, the Spurs found themselves seeking revenge against Phoenix in the same round of the 2007 playoffs. In Game 4, down three in the final minute, Horry needed to intentionally foul Suns star Steve Nash, who was working on a 16 assist game. Horry gave Nash the business, with a stout hip check that sent Nash into the scorer’s table. Nash wasn’t hurt, but after the incident, there was a bizarre on-court scuffle, in which two vital Suns players, Amare Stoudemire and Boris Diaw, left the bench to defend Nash. The two, along with Horry (who was suspended for an additional game), were suspended for the upcoming Game 5.
Without two of their best players for the critical matchup, the Suns couldn’t overcome the Spurs, and lost Game 6 two days later in San Antonio. In a sense, Horry unintentionally sacrificed himself for two games in order to piss off Stoudemire and Diaw, helping the Spurs clinch the series without him. The Spurs cruised to a 5-game victory over the fourth seeded Jazz in the Western Conference Finals, due in large part to a first-round upset by an underdog 8 seed Warriors over the top seeded Mavericks.
In the finals, Horry had his first playoff look at a young Lebron James, but the Cavaliers were no match for the veteran-led Spurs. Horry took home his seventh and final NBA title.
A year later, Horry finally called it quits. He finished his career with the most career playoff three-pointers made and playoff games played in NBA history. He is the only player not on the 1960s Boston Celtics to have 7 or more championships.
Is he in the Hall of Fame? Does he have a lucrative shoe deal? Well I looked at his last tweet, and I think it could tell you.
Legend status.
NBA historians and fans have long since been debating Robert Horry’s merits. Is he actually the most clutch player of all time? Did he deserve seven championships? Is he lucky? Is he the GOAT?
I only believe that in an era filled with NBA legends like Hakeem Olajuwon, Clyde Drexler, Shaquille O’Neal, and Tim Duncan, weaving through it all and bathing in champagne was the most interesting player of his time: Big Shot Bob.
Jack Lido is a New York sports homer who is currently working for the Brooklyn Nets. This story was inspired by his love of ‘90s basketball he watches in old highlight film and documentaries, and 2000s basketball he grew up with. You can follow him @JackSLido.
