7-time NBA champion Robert Horry picks his 2 favorite title teams

Legendary former NBA combo forward Robert Horry proved himself to be a thoroughly modern player. An athletic, 6-foot-10 forward, the Alabama alum could be toggled at either forward spot and tended to get red-hot from distance when it mattered most.

MORE: 3-time All-Star, Lakers champ breaks down insane 2000 NBA Finals run

Horry is just one of many league luminaries who'll attend the All-Star Weekend celebration in Los Angeles from Feb. 13-15. 

"I've always felt like it was a basketball town. You think about a city that has a great NBA and a great college team — you think of UCLA, you think of the Lakers. So you think about all the great players that have come out of the LA area," Horry remarks to The Sporting News. "You think about who's in the league now — you think about [Russell] Westbrook, [James] Harden, DeMar DeRozan, Paul George — and so it's a basketball city, man. You think about all the great football teams and hockey teams that've come through here but at the end of the day, I think basketball is king."

Robert Horry Pinpoints His Two Favorite Title Teams — Of Seven!

No player since the ABA/NBA merger has won more championships than Robert Horry. "Big Shot Bob" claimed a whopping seven titles, with three different franchises, across a 16-year playing career as a core role player.

"I actually have 1A and 1B [among favorite title teams]. I think the '95 championship because of that run we made, not having homecourt advantage, happened to be a repeat when nobody thought we would. And then of course going 15-1 with the Lakers is an incredible run," Horry notes. "You think about, in 2001, what we were able to do. Losing the first game of the NBA Finals just pissed us off. So those are 1A and 1B, because both of those runs are hard to do."

Both those titles represented those respective squads' second straight. The Lakers had achieved a unique level of basketball dominance.

Led by Hall of Famers Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant, Los Angeles swept the Portland Trail Blazers, Sacramento Kings, and San Antonio Spurs in the Western Conference playoffs before dropping Game 1 of the NBA Finals to MVP guard Allen Iverson's Philadelphia 76ers. The Lakers recovered and promptly won four in a row to nab their second of three straight championships. 

During the playoffs, Los Angeles beat its opponents by a bonkers average margin of 14 points.

Horry was near the peak of his power during that magical Rockets run, however. That club's sprint to the Finals was considerably less dominant, but no less impressive. At 47-35, Houston entered the West playoffs in 1995 as a No. 6 seed, but would go on to improbably topple several favored conference rivals near the peaks of their powers. 

The Rockets took down Karl Malone and John Stockton's Utah Jazz in a five-game first-round series (back when the first-round was a best-of-five matchup). Houston rallied from a 3-1 deficit to throttle Charles Barkley, Kevin Johnson and Dan Majerle's Phoenix Suns in seven games.

"Nobody on that team could guard Charles Barkley, so they all looked down at me, we were down 3-1, like, 'Rob, you got him?' Man, I'll take the challenge! And we came back in that series and won that," Horry remembers. "We were down 3-1, they put me on Charles Barkley. I ain't saying I was a game changer, but that changed up how we played. We went small ball, and we just ran and played, and played great defense, and we went on to win the championship."

Hakeem Olajuwon was out for blood in the West Finals, as he galvanized the Rockets to topple league MVP David Robinson's San Antonio Spurs. A Dennis Rodman meltdown helped Houston seal the deal.

After surviving that murderer's row, however, the Rockets were in for a treat in the Finals. They swept a young Orlando Magic team, led by All-Stars O'Neal, Penny Hardaway and Horace Grant.

"Actually, it goes to show you, it's all about matchups. And I love Horace Grant to death, but I don't think Horace Grant was used to playing someone like me," Horry observes. "Because you think about it, we kind of were the originators of small ball."

Grant, also an athletic 6-foot-10 forward, was far bulkier than Horry and a four-time All-Defensive Teamer — but Grant likely wasn't expecting the limber Horry to frequently leak out to the 3-point line quite as often as he did.

Horry also proved his mettle on both sides of the ball, and was so integral a piece for the Rockets that he even received some interest in a possible Finals MVP bid.

"This is one of the greatest moments for me that will never be talked about, and nobody even knows this. I remember, after we swept Orlando, someone came and said, 'Man, they're mentioning you for MVP.' I'm like, 'What? ...I said, 'You're bulls----ing.' They're like, 'No, I'm serious — because of your numbers.'"

In the Finals, Horry averaged 17.8 points on .438/.379/.667 shooting splits, 10.0 rebounds, 3.8 dimes, 3.0 steals (!), and 2.3 blocks per. That 37.9 percent conversion efficacy arrived on 7.3 triple takes a night.

"I've never been a numbers guy. I'll always worry about the dub. I looked at my numbers, I was like, 'Damn, I'm good!' The steals I averaged, the rebounds, the points, I was like, 'Wow.' Even though Dream[Olajuwon]  just dominated, the fact that I just got a mention for MVP of that series was an honor for me," Horry says now.