Al Horford - Hall of Fame?

[Ssj16]

Al Horford being in the HoF is pretty sad to me but I always gripe on the NBA HoF as it has such a low bar I'm sure some RealGM posters have been inducted.

I think to be in any serious HoF along with stats you need to add to the story of the NBA. 30 years from now, no one is really going to remember Horford as a legend of the game.

[Masigond]

How often does it need to be mentioned: There... is... NO... NBA Hall of Fame!

It's the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame, and achievements outside of the NBA are considered as well. As has been already mentioned: Horford has had quite a good college career.
His NBA career lacks some glitz as he doesn't have mindboggling stats or accolades, but it's not that bad either. 5 All-Star nominations, 1 All-NBA team nomination, 1 All-Defense team nomination, 1 Championship, and the advanced stats love him. They show him quite strongly as a Top 100 player of all time in terms of impact. Let's sink that in: His teams almost always qualified for the playoffs with several deep runs. So one could assume that he was underrated for most of his career (never really high in the MVP or DPOY votings). But should the HoF then underrate him, too?

But I also say: He is one of the weaker candidates, and there is enough reason not to see him as worthy of the Hall of Fame.

[jkvonny]

The modern day Robert Horry.

Sure, why not? Lol

[Drakeem]

No, please no. For him to be considered with his relatively tame NBA career, he would have had to have been an ATG in college and for international play. Lets stop giving people things they didn’t earn bc we liked them.

[The Servant]

Bro its the hall of fame not the hall of really high end role players who sniffed a couple ASG's.

Accolades are lacking to say the least. He has played on stacked teams. Oh, he made the playoffs with Jalen Brown, Tatum, Smart, Irving, Jrue, Prozingus, Isaiah Thomas, Rozier etc etc. Wow, so hard!

He plays winning basketball and is good. Basketball fans who know rate him pretty highly as a top end role player/good starter, but the HoF should be for elite star players.

[Mirotic12]

This Horford hall of fame thread is the same as the Kyle Lowry and Pascal Siakam hall of fame threads here. To this point in time, none of them have done enough in their careers to be hall of famers. There are many better already retired players than them that are not in the hall.

[TheGeneral99]

I would yes, he sneaks in eventually.

5 all-star teams and an NBA champion...also one of the best defensive bigs of the last decade.

[TheGeneral99]

Bro its the hall of fame not the hall of really high end role players who sniffed a couple ASG's.

Accolades are lacking to say the least. He has played on stacked teams. Oh, he made the playoffs with Jalen Brown, Tatum, Smart, Irving, Jrue, Prozingus, Isaiah Thomas, Rozier etc etc. Wow, so hard!

He plays winning basketball and is good. Basketball fans who know rate him pretty highly as a top end role player/good starter, but the HoF should be for elite star players.

He made 5 all-star teams, not a couple.

NBA players with 5 all-star selections include Billups, Tim Hardaway, Dennis Johnson, Reggie Miller, Bob McAdoo, Mullin, Klay, Webber, Love etc. Last time I checked Billups, Hardaway, Johnson, Miller, McAdoo, Mullin and Webber were HOFers. Klay and Love are also sure fire HOFs.

[NZB2323]

I know the basketball HOF has a low bar, but BBREF has his probability of making it at 23.78%.

I mean, yeah, the guy is a winner who has a championship, but the same is true of Horace Grant, Danny Ainge, Rasheed Wallace, Shawn Marion, Sam Cassell, and Rip Hamilton, and none of those guys are in the HOF. Is Al Horford better than those guys? Did he have a better career than those guys?

[NZB2323]

Bro its the hall of fame not the hall of really high end role players who sniffed a couple ASG's.

Accolades are lacking to say the least. He has played on stacked teams. Oh, he made the playoffs with Jalen Brown, Tatum, Smart, Irving, Jrue, Prozingus, Isaiah Thomas, Rozier etc etc. Wow, so hard!

He plays winning basketball and is good. Basketball fans who know rate him pretty highly as a top end role player/good starter, but the HoF should be for elite star players.

He made 5 all-star teams, not a couple.

NBA players with 5 all-star selections include Billups, Tim Hardaway, Dennis Johnson, Reggie Miller, Bob McAdoo, Mullin, Klay, Webber, Love etc. Last time I checked Billups, Hardaway, Johnson, Miller, McAdoo, Mullin and Webber were HOFers. Klay and Love are also sure fire HOFs.

Do you think Al Horford is on the same level as those guys? Billups has a finals MVP. McAdoo has a MVP. Reggie Miller was the best player on his team, owned the 3 point record, was the most efficient scorer of his era, and had the some of the most clutch playoff performances in NBA history. Klay Thompson has the record for most points in a quarter and has 4 rings.

The vast majority of Hall of Famers have more all-star appearances than Horford.

Is Horford really better than Horace Grant, Danny Ainge, Rasheed Wallace, Shawn Marion, Sam Cassell, and Rip Hamilton, who aren’t in the HOF?

[TheGeneral99]

Bro its the hall of fame not the hall of really high end role players who sniffed a couple ASG's.

Accolades are lacking to say the least. He has played on stacked teams. Oh, he made the playoffs with Jalen Brown, Tatum, Smart, Irving, Jrue, Prozingus, Isaiah Thomas, Rozier etc etc. Wow, so hard!

He plays winning basketball and is good. Basketball fans who know rate him pretty highly as a top end role player/good starter, but the HoF should be for elite star players.

He made 5 all-star teams, not a couple.

NBA players with 5 all-star selections include Billups, Tim Hardaway, Dennis Johnson, Reggie Miller, Bob McAdoo, Mullin, Klay, Webber, Love etc. Last time I checked Billups, Hardaway, Johnson, Miller, McAdoo, Mullin and Webber were HOFers. Klay and Love are also sure fire HOFs.

Do you think Al Horford is on the same level as those guys? Billups has a finals MVP. McAdoo has a MVP. Reggie Miller was the best player on his team, owned the 3 point record, was the most efficient scorer of his era, and had the some of the most clutch playoff performances in NBA history. Klay Thompson has the record for most points in a quarter and has 4 rings.

The vast majority of Hall of Famers have more all-star appearances than Horford.

Is Horford really better than Horace Grant, Danny Ainge, Rasheed Wallace, Shawn Marion, Sam Cassell, and Rip Hamilton, who aren’t in the HOF?

It's tough.

I think Rasheed, Cassell and Rip are very underrated. The issue is Rasheed only made the all-star team 4 times, Cassell only made 1 all-star team and Rip made 3 all-star teams.

I would put Horford slightly above guys like Richmond, Tim Hardaway, Mo Cheeks etc. who made the HOF.

One thing that Horford does have is longevity and the fact that he's also one of the best defensive bigs on the league with multiple all-defensive team selections.

[Masigond]

One thing that Horford does have is longevity and the fact that he's also one of the best defensive bigs on the league with multiple all-defensive team selections.

Longevity yes, one of the best defensive bigs also yes, but he has only one single All-Defensive Team nomination (2nd team in 17-18).

The reason why so many don't see him as a Hall-of-Famer is quite arguably the same why he has relatively few recognition concerning personal awards: He was quietly doing great work for many years, but he was flying under too many people's radar.

[Doctor MJ]

Al Horford being in the HoF is pretty sad to me but I always gripe on the NBA HoF as it has such a low bar I'm sure some RealGM posters have been inducted.

I think to be in any serious HoF along with stats you need to add to the story of the NBA. 30 years from now, no one is really going to remember Horford as a legend of the game.

So, my general thoughts on this:

1. It's not the NBA Hall, it's the Basketball Hall. The fact that Horford was on arguably the most successful college core of the 21st century is going to matter.

2. I think a lot of modern fans tend to approach the Hall like "If I don't know about it, it shouldn't be there" when talking about the deeper past, and I would suggest this is backwards. The idea isn't to match the level of knowledge the average fan has, but to provide a path for those who want to understand history better than they do.

So for example, a modern fan will be likely to say KC Jones shouldn't be in the Hall because he was a mere role player who never made all-star. But from a basketball history perspective, the duo of Bill Russell & KC Jones basically invented modern defense on both the college & pro level, and the story of their relationship, and specifically how Jones mentored Russell thinking through the finer points of team defense, is actually really important.

And yeah you can mention Jones in passing while talking about Russell's legacy, but in doing so you won't just understand Jones less, you'll understand Russell and the evolution of elite basketball defense less.

Not saying the Hall is following all of this to the letter - I've got my disagreements with them too - but there's just a lot more going on than how good big of a star a guy was.

With Horford specifically, while he was not the first big to pivot and start taking 3's, he's arguably the the avatar of it. Him adjusting to league paradigm shifts beginning in his age 29 season has everything to do with why he's still around in high demand at age 39. The story of bigs completely changing their shot diet midway through their career to become 3-point specialists is important to understanding what happened in the data ball era, and so whichever player we think most represents this shift, is someone we should consider for Hall status.

[Doctor MJ]

This Horford hall of fame thread is the same as the Kyle Lowry and Pascal Siakam hall of fame threads here. To this point in time, none of them have done enough in their careers to be hall of famers. There are many better already retired players than them that are not in the hall.

I would say that Horford & Lowry are guys who have done enough that we should expect they're going to get voted into the Hall, and if you disagree, I think you're projecting your own view of what the Hall should be rather than what it is.

I'd agree with you that Pascal isn't there yet, he's just someone on a trajectory to make if the rest of his career doesn't disappoint.

[Doctor MJ]

Bro its the hall of fame not the hall of really high end role players who sniffed a couple ASG's.

Accolades are lacking to say the least. He has played on stacked teams. Oh, he made the playoffs with Jalen Brown, Tatum, Smart, Irving, Jrue, Prozingus, Isaiah Thomas, Rozier etc etc. Wow, so hard!

He plays winning basketball and is good. Basketball fans who know rate him pretty highly as a top end role player/good starter, but the HoF should be for elite star players.

He made 5 all-star teams, not a couple.

NBA players with 5 all-star selections include Billups, Tim Hardaway, Dennis Johnson, Reggie Miller, Bob McAdoo, Mullin, Klay, Webber, Love etc. Last time I checked Billups, Hardaway, Johnson, Miller, McAdoo, Mullin and Webber were HOFers. Klay and Love are also sure fire HOFs.

So, I think the reality is that HOF voters aren't looking at number of all-star selections as a key threshold. It's reasonable to think that a 5-time all-star is going to get consideration by HOF voters, but in the end, Reggie Miller is in the Hall first and foremost for the indelible impression he left in the playoffs.

This then to say, I don't think Horford is a HOF lock based on how many all-star selections he has, but the fact he was named an all-star multiple times definitely helps his case.

[Doctor MJ]

Bro its the hall of fame not the hall of really high end role players who sniffed a couple ASG's.

Accolades are lacking to say the least. He has played on stacked teams. Oh, he made the playoffs with Jalen Brown, Tatum, Smart, Irving, Jrue, Prozingus, Isaiah Thomas, Rozier etc etc. Wow, so hard!

He plays winning basketball and is good. Basketball fans who know rate him pretty highly as a top end role player/good starter, but the HoF should be for elite star players.

Bro its the Hall of Fame, not the Hall of Superstars. Halls of Fame are inventions by museums to help tell the history of many different fields, only a fraction of those fields actually being competitive sports.

(I should note that the word "Fame" here in a modern context is absolutely confusing the issue, because it's not about recognizing individuals who are already famous, but about telling stories about the field itself, which is why it's never actually been about the best X players in any given era, but rather about whose journey lets the Hall in question tell the story about what was happening in the field itself at any given time.)

[OldSchoolNoBull]

With Horford specifically, while he was not the first big to pivot and start taking 3's, he's arguably the the avatar of it. Him adjusting to league paradigm shifts beginning in his age 29 season has everything to do with why he's still around in high demand at age 39. The story of bigs completely changing their shot diet midway through their career to become 3-point specialists is important to understanding what happened in the data ball era, and so whichever player we think most represents this shift, is someone we should consider for Hall status.

I don't have a strong opinion about Horford and the HOF, but based on this logic, Doc, do you think, for example, Brook Lopez should get in the HOF? He's another big that re-invented himself midway through his career as a stretch 5 and won a ring.

[TheGeneral99]

With Horford specifically, while he was not the first big to pivot and start taking 3's, he's arguably the the avatar of it. Him adjusting to league paradigm shifts beginning in his age 29 season has everything to do with why he's still around in high demand at age 39. The story of bigs completely changing their shot diet midway through their career to become 3-point specialists is important to understanding what happened in the data ball era, and so whichever player we think most represents this shift, is someone we should consider for Hall status.

I don't have a strong opinion about Horford and the HOF, but based on this logic, Doc, do you think, for example, Brook Lopez should get in the HOF? He's another big that re-invented himself midway through his career as a stretch 5 and won a ring.

Lopez made 1 all-star team in his career, much different from Horford who made 5.

[Jamaaliver]

His resume is pretty solid. Definitely in terms of team success.

Between college and NBA, the longevity -- he'll be a footnote in the story of modern basketball.
But he's certainly earned that place in the story.

3rd Ballot Hall of Famer IMHO.

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[Chuck Everett]

I don't see it. If he gets in, Robert Horry should get in as well.