No. 73 - Robert Horry

I’ll admit, this one is a bit of a head-scratcher.

How can a player who ended up averaging just 7.0 points per game in his career (7.9 in the playoffs) end up on a list of the 100 greatest pro basketball players? How can he be ranked higher than players who won scoring or rebounding titles such as Elvin Hayes, Bob McAdoo and Chris Webber?

I briefly considered just deleting him. It’d be easier to do that and include No. 101 on my list – George Yardley from the 1950s – than to explain how Horry ended up on this ranking. In the end, this system values winning and productive play per minutes more than it does counting stats and who is a bigger winner in the post-Bill Russell-Celtics era than Robert Horry?

Every year, when the Jordan-LeBron-Jabbar-Wilt-Kobe-Shaq GOAT arguments heat up, Robert Horry is invariably mentioned as a Michael Jordan counterpoint. The Facebook/Twitter rants usually go like this.

“Man, it’s not even close. What’s LeBron’s record in the NBA Finals now? It’s 3-6. Michael went 6-0.”

The comeback?

“If that’s the only stat that matters then Robert Horry is the greatest ever. He was 7-0.”

Horry won those seven NBA titles with three different franchises – two in Houston with Hakeem Olajuwon, three in Los Angeles with Shaq and Kobe and two in San Antonio with Tim Duncan. Unlike James and Jordan, Horry’s teams never missed the playoffs. He was undoubtedly a winner. His teams won nearly 67 percent of their regular season games and nearly 64 percent of their postseason games. And it wasn’t as if he was Jack Haley at the end of the Bulls bench waiving a towel. In those seven NBA title runs, his average minutes played in the playoffs were:

1993-1994: 33.8
1994-1995: 38.2
1999-2000: 26.9
2000-2001: 23.9
2001-2002: 37.0
2004-2005: 26.9
2006-2007: 20.1

He had several nicknames, but the one that gets mentioned most often is “Big Shot Bob” for his record of making clutch three-point shots in several playoff games. Still, this ranking isn’t about style points, it’s about statistical points. How did Horry end up on here?

Two of the four advanced stats this system relies on are based on per-minute production. There’s no advantage to playing 40 minutes versus four when it comes to Player Efficiency Rating (PER) and Boxscore +/-. Both are tilted towards scorers, so Horry doesn’t do particularly well in either, but he’s not at a disadvantage to someone like Hayes, who led the league in minutes played twice. In fact, let’s look at Horry’s 10 best season PERs versus Hayes, McAdoo and Webber.

How Horry measures up in PER
	Horry	Hayes	McAdoo	Webber
1.	14.9	19.8	25.8	24.7
2.	14.5	19.4	24.7	24.4
3.	14.5	19.4	23.3	23.6
4.	14.5	19.1	22.0	23.4
5.	14.4	19.0	21.8	21.8
6.	14.3	18.9	20.6	21.7
7.	14.2	18.4	20.0	20.9
8.	13.7	18.3	16.8	20.9
9.	13.5	18.2	16.3	20.1
10.	13.5	17.5	15.9	19.5

Clearly, Hayes, McAdoo and Webber were more productive on the floor. All three of them were No. 1 options on their teams, while Horry was at best a No. 3.

Horry, though, consistently raised his game in the playoffs, narrowing the gap.

How Horry measures up in playoff PER
	Horry	Hayes	McAdoo	Webber
1.	17.9	24.9	26.2	27.1
2.	17.3	20.3	24.3	23.3
3.	16.7	20.0	21.1	22.1
4.	16.2	19.9	19.8	22.1
5.	16.1	19.2	18.4	17.6
6.	15.2	18.8	17.7	16.8
7.	14.7	17.9	17.6	16.7
8.	14.2	15.7	15.8	14.6
9.	13.5	13.5	12.2	14.3
10.	13.2	10.4		12.4

Boxscore +/- takes PER and factors it into to whether the team won. Hayes, McAdoo and Webber all had several seasons on teams that didn’t make the playoffs. Horry scores better here.

How Horry measures up in Box +/-
	Horry	Hayes*	McAdoo*	Webber
1.	4.8	3.4	5.0	6.6
2.	4.1	3.2	4.8	6.2
3.	4.1	1.7	4.7	5.9
4.	3.5	1.3	3.4	5.9
5.	3.5	1.2	3.0	5.3
6.	3.3	0.7	1.3	4.9
7.	3.2	negative	negative	4.9
8.	2.5	negative	negative	4.8
9.	2.5	negative	negative	3.8
10.	2.3	negative	negative	3.0

* Box +/- isn’t available for Hayes’ first five years, which were among his best. McAdoo’s rookie year doesn’t have a +/-.

Again, Horry’s scores go up in the playoffs.

How Horry measures up in playoff Box +/-
	Horry	Hayes *	McAdoo	Webber
1.	7.3	7.2	4.7	8.6
2.	6.3	5.1	2.5	7.2
3.	6.1	2.7	2.2	5.7
4.	5.7	2.4	0.4	5.4
5.	5.6	1.0	0.3	3.4
6.	5.6	0.2	Negative	2.4
7.	5.5	Negative	Negative	0.9
8.	5.1	Negative	Negative	Negative
9.	5.0		Negative	Negative
10.	4.6			Negative

* Box +/- isn’t available for Hayes’ first two playoff years. McAdoo’s rookie year doesn’t have a +/-.

In 16 seasons, Horry had a negative +/- only in the 2007-2008 playoffs, his last season when his knees were shot. He never had a single negative Value Over Replacement Player (VORP) in either the regular season or playoffs. Hayes had two negative VORPs and McAdoo six.

Once you get past the advanced stats, Horry has the advantage because his teams won way more consistently. If you add regular season and playoffs together, the career winning percentages stack up this way:

Robert Horry: 898-463 – 65.9%
Chris Webber: 512-399 – 56.2%
Bob McAdoo: 503-443 - 53.2%
Elvin Hayes: 698-708 – 49.6%

During Horry’s last season, Sports Illustrated published a piece asking if Horry should be a Hall of Famer. The best statistical comparison would be K.C. Jones, who won eight NBA titles with the Celtics in nine years. Jones is in the Hall of Fame despite averaging just 7.4 points and 4.3 assists over his career. There are all kinds of threads on the web arguing whether Horry was the ultimate glue guy sought out by various teams with title hopes versus just a lucky guy along for the ride.

Horry once was asked if he’d rather have his career or the career of Charles Barkley, who only made one NBA Final, which his team lost, but was always considered one of the greats of the game. Interestingly, Horry picked Barkley’s career because “he was the man.”

I look at it this way, if I’m at the YMCA and picking my five. I’m taking Barkley over Horry because I need a No. 1 option. The question changes though if you already have a good No. 1 option. If that’s the case, I might look for a guy who can guard anyone on the floor, finish in transition, shoot the 3 to space the floor and doesn’t need plays run for him. In that case, as it was in Houston, Los Angeles and San Antonio, then Horry is my next pick.

Robert Horry bio info
Career	1992-2008
Games	1,107
Points	7.0
Rebounds	4.8
Assists	2.1
FG Pct.	42.5%
All-Star games	0
MVPs	0
NBA titles	7
Playoff seasons	16
Playoff games	244
Points	7.9
Rebounds	5.6
Assists	2.4
FG Pct.	42.6%
Hall of Fame

Top 100 rankings
	Points	Top 100 ranking
1-year	268.57	Not in top 100
5-year	1,259.07	96th
10-year	2,415.36	59th
Career	3,465.08	34th

Robert Horry at his peak
2001-2002	Horry	Top 5	Points
PER	14.5	25.98
Win Shares	6.9	14.17
Box +/-	4.1	6.75
VORP	3.3	6.63
Total Advanced Stats	28.8	53.52	53.81
Playoff PER	14.7	26.96
Win Shares	2.2	2.64
Box +/-	6.3	7.39
VORP	1.5	1.48
Total Advanced Stats	24.7	38.47	64.21
Reg. Season Win %	71.60		71.60
Playoff Win %	78.95		78.95
MVP Voting (75 points)	0		0
Playoff MVP (25 points)	0		0
Total Score			268.57

Horry’s 10 greatest seasons
2001-2002	268.57
2004-2005	255.75
1993-1994	249.09
2000-2001	243.82
1999-2000	241.85
1997-1998	241.72
2003-2004	240.12
1994-1995	236.75
2006-2007	231.66
2005-2006	206.03

Career winning percentage
	W	L	Pct.
Regular Season	743	374	66.52%
Playoffs	155	89	63.52%