Is Glenn Robinson Hall Of Fame Worthy? No (Reasons Why)

Glenn Robinson was a good scorer and had a nice NBA career, but he has almost no case for making the Hall of Fame. The Big Dog did not win much in his career and did not put up great stats. His college success was the most notable aspect of his career but even that is not enough to put him in the Hall. 

Was Glenn Robinson a Hall of Fame Player? 

Glenn Robinson made two All Star teams, but his career as a whole didn’t leave him very close to Hall of Fame consideration. You can see his career counting stats below. 

Games	Pts	Asts	Rbnds	T/O	Blks
688	20.7	2.7	6.1	3.1	.6

While this is not official, players are generally selected for the Hall of Fame based on three criteria. One criteria is winning. 

Players who win a lot are often inducted to the Hall of Fame even if their career accomplishments and statistics might leave them a little short. 

A second criteria for Hall of Fame selection is career awards and accomplishments. These are things like winning MVP’s, making All Star games or being chosen for All NBA or All NBA Defensive teams. 

Finally, players are chosen at least partially based on their career statistics. 

In general, these Hall of Fame criteria operate on a sliding scale. 

A player with absolutely insane career stats is likely to make the Hall of Fame no matter if he wins a title or not.  Players like John Stockton show this is true. 

Players with amazing career awards and accomplishments, like Charles Barkley, don’t need to win a title to make the Hall of Fame either. 

Meanwhile, players who win but are role players, like Big Shot Bob Horry  or Steve Kerr, don’t make the Hall of Fame simply because they won titles.  

But other players who have decent career stats or accomplishments but who might otherwise fall short of the Hall of Fame often get in if they were on winning teams. 

Below, I’ll take a look at  Glenn Robinson’s case for the Hall of Fame in all three areas. 

Glenn Robinson Hall of Fame Criteria: Winning

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Glenn Robinson won an NBA title in 2005 with the San Antonio Spurs, but I still would not call him a winning player.

The Big Dog only played in nine regular season games for the Spurs that year. And during the Finals, in which the Spurs slipped by the Detroit Pistons 4-3, Robinson sat on the bench for four full games and averaged less than 5 minutes per game total.

The key players on that team were Tim Duncan and Manu Ginnobili and Tony Parker. Even Robert Horry, who was winning the 6th of his 7 titles as one of the NBA’s great role players, played 29 minutes a game for the team in the Finals.

So Robinson didn’t play a big part for the team on which he won his only NBA title. Before that, he did not do much winning in the league either. 

His early Bucks teams mostly did not make the playoffs. When matched with a young Ray Allen, the team did make one run to the conference finals. But Allen Iverson was too much for the young Bucks squad, and they never reached those heights again. 

Robinson kicked around the league for a couple years before hooking on with the Spurs for one season. 

The lack of winning does not seem to be entirely bad luck for Robinson. He took too many mid-range jumpers and played too little defense. 

Robinson’s game was mostly one of empty stats: he could fill it up as a young player but didn’t score very efficiently, didn’t pass that well and didn’t play too much defense. 

That is a recipe for decent counting stats but not for winning. That is one of the biggest issues with Glenn Robinson’s career and his Hall of Fame candidacy: he was not much of a winning player. 

Glenn Robinson Hall of Fame Criteria: Career Awards & Accomplishments

Another category that voters use to determine who will get in the Hall of Fame is career accomplishments and awards. Glenn Robinson got a few, but not nearly enough for the Hall of Fame. 

Robinson’s biggest career accomplishments were his two All Star games. He made the All Star game in 2000 and 2001. 

The only other award Robinson won was making the All-Rookie team. He was 3rd in Rookie of the Year voting behind Hall of Famers Grant Hill and Jason Kidd.

Being 1st Team All Rookie and a two-time All Star is not much of a resume for someone being considered for the Hall of Fame. 

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Glenn Robinson Hall of Fame Criteria: Advanced Stats & Player Comparison

The Big Dog’s lack of winning and relatively poor career awards mean he would have to have insanely outlier career stats to have any chance at the Hall of Fame. 

You can see below that Robinson’s career stats are not anywhere near incredible enough to put him in the Hall of Fame. 

Here again are Robinson’s career counting stats:

Games	Pts	Asts	Rbnds	T/O	Blks
688	20.7	2.7	6.1	3.1	.6

For comparison’s sake, here are Penny Hardaway’s career counting stats:

Games	Pts	Asts	Rbnds	T/O	Blks
704	15.2	5.0	4.5	2.5	.4

Finally, let’s look at an obvious Hall of Famer. Here are Larry Bird’s career stats. 

Games	Pts	Asts	Rbnds	T/O	Blks
897	24.3	6.3	10.0	3.1	.8

I chose these players deliberately. All three players were small forwards. 

Larry Legend, of course, was on another level. In addition to putting up insanely better offensive stats than either of the other two forwards, Bird was better on defense than you think. 

Bird  is clearly a Hall of Famer and it is not close. 

Hardaway is not in the Hall of Fame but was a huge star in his day whose career was decimated by injury. As of the writing of this article, he does not seem likely to make the Hall. 

When you compare his stats to the Big Dog, it is close. Robinson scored more, but Hardaway was the better creator and easily the better defensive player. 

I would take Penny, but you could at least make the case for Robinson based on the counting stats alone. 

Let’s look at some advanced stats to see what they show. 

Player	PER	Win Shares	Box Plus/Minus
Glenn Robinson	17.5	39.8	.1
Penny Hardaway	17.4	61.9	2.5
Larry Bird	23.5	145.8	6.9

These stats really start to separate the three players. 

All three are statistics that attempt to quantify everything a player does on the floor for their team.

All these types of stats have some flaws, so it is best not to rely too heavily on any one of them. But when you start to pile them up, you notice the players you think of as the greatest ever tend to finish at the top of the list. 

Here, it is obvious that Bird is on another level and that neither of these players was one of the greatest to ever play like he was. 

But they also show that Penny was two steps above Glenn Robinson. He had a much better box plus/minus and way more win shares. Penny helped his teams win in a way that the Big Dog never did. 

Another quick stat to support that assertion: Penny had career ratings of 108 on offense and 105 on defense. Robinson had a 102 rating on offense and 107 on defense. 

Lower is better on defense and higher is better on offense. So Penny contributed more to his teams on offense AND defense. And Glenn Robinson was a poor defender.

This is the part of the article when I remind you that Penny has not, and probably will not, make the Hall of Fame. 

If Penny is not a Hall of Famer, then Glenn Robinson is clearly not either. 

Could Glenn Robinson Make the Hall of Fame for His College Career?

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The only avenue open for Glenn Robinson to make the Hall of Fame is his college career. 

The Basketball Hall of Fame is not the NBA Hall of Fame but rather the Basketball Hall of Fame. There are players who have been inducted for their basketball accomplishments outside the NBA.

Some of those people are college basketball coaches. Many are players from other countries who contributed to basketball’s success across the globe. 

Just a few are players from the U.S. who did not qualify based on their pro career. Two who come to mind are Ralph Sampson and David Thompson. 

But both of those players had otherworldly college careers and then were fairly accomplished in professional basketball as well before injuries (Sampson) or drugs (Thompson) dragged them down.

The question to ask then is if Glen Robinson had the same type of college career as David Thompson or Ralph Sampson. The answer to that is clearly no.

Robinson had two great years for the Purdue Boilermakers, especially his second college season when he led the nation in scoring and took the team to the final eight of the NCAA tournament.

The Big Dog won the Naismith award as the best college basketball player that year and deserved it. 

But David Thompson led N.C. State to an undefeated season in a year they were banned from postseason play and to a national title the next year. On their way to that national title, they beat Bill Walton’s UCLA team in a tournament-classic double overtime semifinal.

Sampson was a household name throughout his college career and won three Naismith Awards as the nation’s best college basketball player. 

Glenn Robinson had a nice college career but it was not at the level of a David Thompson or a Ralph Sampson. 

Even a player like Christian Laettner, who was a college legend and made the Original Dream Team because of it, did not make the Hall of Fame for his college career. 

Laettner did make the Hall of Fame with the Dream Team but he never did as an individual player. 

Glenn Robinson should not make it either. 

Summary: Glenn Robinson Hall of Fame

Glenn Robinson was a good volume scorer who has no real case for the Hall of Fame. He did not win enough, garner enough awards nor put up good enough career stats to make a strong case for the Hall. Robinson’s college success is probably his best case for making the Hall, but even that is not quite up to the level of Hall of Fame players.