Big-game hunter
AUBURN HILLS, Mich. – Rasheed Wallace decided not to guard Robert Horry, which in the final seconds of overtime in a critical NBA Finals game is about as wise as giving your kid a loaded gun to play with.
'Sheed happens and all, but what the heck did you think the outcome would be?
"I saw Rasheed bite and I said, 'Ohhh, let me stay out here,' " Horry said.
The rest is part of the legacy of Robert Horry, the NBA Finals legend who has crafted a most unusual career. He has spent 13 seasons producing often average play only to hit some of the most remarkable, clutch shots of all time.
Big Shot Bob they've been calling him. He'd prefer Big Shot Rob. But after this, a fourth quarter and overtime for the ages, perhaps the best Finals stretch since Michael Jordan in 1992, Big Game Rob might be a better name.
Thanks to Horry's five three-pointers (including one with 5.8 seconds left in overtime that gave the Spurs a 96-95 victory) and 21 after-halftime points, the San Antonio Spurs are one game away from winning a third NBA title. They take a 3-2 series lead back to Texas for Game 6 on Tuesday.
Horry now is one game from his sixth championship with three different teams (the others being the Houston Rockets and Los Angeles Lakers).
And the Detroit Pistons? They're left wondering what the heck just happened.
"Up two with nine seconds left?" mused Larry Brown, who was baffled that Wallace would – as the player put it, "decided to double Tim Duncan down low" – and leave Horry open for no apparent reason.
"It's Bobby Horry," Tim Duncan said. "He does whatever he wants to do. He's Big Shot Bob."
"You can make it Rob, R-O-B," Horry said. "B-O-B, that's not me."
Whatever the heck Horry's name is, he has always been a bit of a mystery.
How does a 34-year-old bench player with a career scoring average of 7.5 points per game, with a pinched nerve in his left shoulder and a no-show, zero-point first half utterly dominate a game of this magnitude?
How does a 6-foot-10 forward with a career 34.3 three-point shooting percentage get known as one of the most clutch gunners in league history?
"I'll tell you the deal with Rob," said Duncan, who went for 26 points and 19 rebounds but missed six critical free throws in the fourth quarter. "Rob just hangs out the entire game. He does it all season long. He doesn't do anything. He doesn't feel like playing.
"But then you put him in the fourth quarter in a big game and he's like, 'OK, it's time to play now.' And he just turns it on. As funny as that seems, it's how it looks. It's how it is."
Laughed Horry, "Tim's a jerk, man."
That is Horry, though. He never takes anything too seriously, never goes too long without a smile breaking out on his face. For a guy with a knack for winning, he doesn't put a misplaced value on it.
Go figure, but one of sports' greatest winners isn't a winning-isn't-everything-it's-the-only-thing kind of guy.
"That's my philosophy," Horry said. "You've got to have a smile on your face and enjoy the game because there [are] a lot more serious things going on in this world than playing the game of basketball."
Maybe that is why Horry keeps going after so many teams give up on him.
In the 2003 playoffs he shot a miserable 2-for-38 from three-point range for the Lakers and looked tired and done. But Spurs coach Gregg Popovich figured if you rest him during the regular season (conceding he has limited value as an everyday player) he might still have legs to take over when it counts.
"That's who he is," Popovich said. "That's one of the things he does."
Horry in the fourth quarter and overtime did just about everything. He drained threes when he was guarded. He drained them when he was open. He hit one from way out.
"When I made it, I thought, 'Oh, I'm ready now,' " he said.
He had one play in overtime where, with confidence surging through his veins, he put the ball on the deck, slashed to the hole and threw down an outstretched dunk while being fouled, damn near ripping his left arm out of its socket in the process.
"When I was going through the air I was like, 'Please let me get there, please let me get there,' " Horry said. "Maybe a younger Rob could have got there with ease, but I wanted to get to the rack."
Then he laughed. He laughed at himself. He laughed at the joy of knowing that on Father's Day both his father and his son were in the stands. He laughed from the jubilation of knowing he is so close to winning it all again. He laughed at the absurdity of it all.
Big Shot Bob. Big Shot Rob.
He isn't that good. Until he's great.
