Robert Horry said he hated the way his career ended. He said Gregg Popovich put him “on a shelf,” and Horry never left the shelf the last time he wore an NBA uniform. Horry didn’t play a second.

“That hurt me deep,” he said last week.

Horry also said it took him a while to get over this. And after he retired, at a funeral attended by the team in the fall of 2008, Horry didn’t sit with them. He wasn’t a Spur anymore, but that wasn’t the point.

When Popovich approached, reaching out, Horry didn’t say anything. “I was mad at him,” Horry said.

Horry sees things differently now, but he sees something in San Antonio that also isn’t the same. As he watches his old teammates continue on, long past what he thought was possible, and he watches them partner with new teammates, he says he’s not the only one who has changed.

He thinks Popovich has, too.

Horry is still around basketball. He’s an analyst for Time Warner in Los Angeles (“having fun covering the terrible Lakers,” he said dryly), when he’s not in Houston.

He’s also making appearances at the NBA’s request. He’s been to Brazil, China and Greece, and twice to Russia. Last week he was in Toronto.

His visit there, to help sell the NBA All-Star Game next month, is a classic Horry contradiction. As a player, after all, he was never an All-Star.

He also won multiple titles with three different franchises, yet no team has retired his number yet. And next month, again in Toronto, when they announce the Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame finalists, Horry’s name will not be among them. He’s not even on this year’s list of nominees.

Yet there he was in Toronto, a celebrity of note, because there has never been a basketball résumé quite like his. His seven rings have given him a standing that traditional awards cannot.

Horry recently said he didn’t think he would ever be in the Hall of Fame. “People judge a game on points, they judge a game on rebounds,” he said. “They don’t judge a game on everything that you do.”

He’s right. Someone who averaged in single figures for a career isn’t the traditional measure of a Hall of Fame player.

Still, Horry’s statistical contributions are undeniable. For example, he was the first player to record 100 steals, 100 blocks and 100 made 3-pointers in the same season.

Then there is something no one in Springfield, Massachusetts, can deny: Horry’s playoff career included Hall of Fame moments.

In contrast, try remembering the biggest title-winning plays of some of last year’s inductees, such as Spencer Haywood or Louie Dampier.

Horry, however, seems content with who he is. “If I don’t get into the Hall of Fame, I’m going to be talked about more than guys who do get in the Hall of Fame. Everybody is going to sit around saying, what about Robert Horry? My name is always going to be out there.”

It’s certain his name is always going to be out there in San Antonio. His Game 5 in Detroit in 2005 is the most dramatic, championship-turning, individual performance in franchise history.

But even on his way to his second title with the Spurs, in 2007, his time on the court became more limited. That went further the next year.

Still, Horry wanted to come back again in some capacity. Popovich told Horry he would think about it; there was also a chance there would be a need during the season.

The Spurs never called. Horry says all of it “left a bad taste in my mouth,” and he went through a kind of post-career depression.

His weight spiked, for one. “I looked in the mirror once,” he said, laughing, “and I wondered who that was standing there. I was turning into Charles Barkley.”

When Horry looks back now, he understands it was Popovich’s team and choice. “The competitor in me thought I could still contribute,” he said. “I had so much pride.”

But when Horry looks back now, he also thinks Popovich has changed. The Spurs of the past several years reflect that.

Horry didn’t like the way the Spurs played in his five years with them. He says Popovich had a system, and players were expected to go from Point A to Point B on schedule. Horry felt that made the Spurs “robotic.”

When Michael Finley arrived in San Antonio, Horry warned him what was coming.

“Be prepared,” Horry told him, “to dumb it down.”

Horry says the Spurs had a saying then. He would do something instinctive, away from the plan, and the coaches would say “That’s a Robert Horry thing.”

“They used to say I didn’t know the plays. I’d say, ‘Man, you’ve run the same plays for years. The other teams know the plays.’ I’d tell them I’m just playing basketball. I’m reading basketball.”

Some of the coaches on the staff admired him for it. Mike Budenholzer, for one, often talked about Horry’s basketball IQ.

Now when Horry watches the Spurs, he sees the style he believes in. There is Popovich’s system, still, but there is flow within it. The Spurs pass and react and pass some more. Sometimes they might even do a Robert Horry thing.

As for former teammates such as Tim Duncan, Manu Ginobili and Tony Parker still playing eight years after he retired?

“Stunning,” Horry said.

He admits he was wrong about them this year. “I’m on the record saying they were too old.”

Now Horry thinks it will be “a tossup” between the Spurs and the Warriors in the Western Conference. A change in Kawhi Leonard is a reason.

“He’s a little tougher and meaner mentally,” Horry said. “He won’t say it, but you can tell by the way he’s playing. He’s saying, ‘This is my team now.’”

That said, Horry says someone else will be the key to the Spurs’ season — Ginobili.

“If he is just half-Manu,” Horry said.

All of Horry is wistful. He spent his career winning, and he always wanted to play a certain way. And here are the Spurs, including some of his former teammates, doing both at a record pace.

“I’d love to play with these guys now,” he said, and no one should be shocked. Horry didn’t want to stop playing, either.

bharvey@express-news.net

Twitter: @Buck_SA