IndyStar.com: Bob Kravitz
Indiana's leading news source for all the top stories, local news, sports and weather.
No more looking back
Finally, five years and a day after The Brawl in Auburn Hills, Mich., the Indiana Pacers are no longer shackled by one of the ugliest moments in professional sports history. Finally, five years and a day after John Green and Ron Artest altered the...
Kravitz: DeVan loving life in this new arena
So, you want to be inspired? Seven months ago, Indianapolis Colts starting right guard Kyle DeVan was back in his hometown of Vacaville, Calif., living with his mom, working as a substitute teacher and as an assistant high school wrestling coach. His...
Bob Kravitz's report card
RUN OFFENSE: B In the long history of Dopey Report Cards, this is the toughest, not to mention the strangest. I really should give one grade for the first 46 minutes and another grade for the last 14. Because for roughly 46 minutes, the Colts were...
Kravitz: Belichick helps Colts win
By eschewing punt in waning minutes of the game, Belichick helps Colts complete comeback Maybe the Lucas Oil Stadium mice burrowed their way into Bill Belichick’s brain. Or maybe one of those indoor fireworks, which set off a small fire at the...
Colts vs. Patriots: Epic rivalry continues tonight
Manning-Brady face-off is one for the history books There’s a guy in town, name is Larry Bird. Throughout the 1980s, he was one half of sport’s greatest team and individual rivalry — the Boston Celtics and Los Angeles Lakers, Bird...
The real showdown? It's Manning vs. Belichick
They sat there for hours, two football savants, sitting at a table near the pool at the Ihilani Hotel outside Honolulu before the 2007 Pro Bowl. Peyton Manning, just coming off his first Super Bowl, would move salt and pepper shakers to make a point....
Here's what you need to know by Sunday
It’s just another game. And this is just another Colts-Patriots rivalry glossary because, well, we always do this before Colts-Jags and Colts-Texans games, right? Bill Belichick: Evil genius. Pulls wings off butterflies for entertainment...
Kravitz: Caldwell pushing (almost) all the right buttons in 1st season
There are no awards given for half- season accomplishments, and even if there were, Jim Caldwell’s name likely would be overlooked in any Coach of the Year discussion. The Indianapolis Colts’ top man is a stealth coach, neither memorable...
Injuries: Colts' Super Bowl threat?
First, the good news: Nobody on the Indianapolis Colts’ active roster got injured Saturday. Although I’m hearing rumblings that public-relations man Craig Kelley may have aggravated his carpal tunnel while updating the team’s...
Kravitz: Wayne's the best, every day of the week
Let the numbers do the talking. Indianapolis Colts wide receiver Reggie Wayne is: Second in the NFL in receptions with 51, although the top pass-catcher, the New York Giants’ Steve Smith, has played one more game and leads Wayne by just two...
Kravitz: Granger ducks out after this loss
This is what a leader does — what Danny Granger didn’t bother to do — after Tuesday night’s miserable effort against the Denver Nuggets, the Indiana Pacers’ third straight poor performance of this young season. A leader,...
Kravitz: All about Addai's magic
When the call came in from the sideline, a play that asked for Joseph Addai to run left, then pull back and throw a pass to Reggie Wayne in the end zone, Indianapolis Colts left guard Ryan Lilja had this thought: “Uh-oh.” Or something...
Despite tough losses, IU on the right track
Letting It Out: Go ahead, Indiana University football fans: Scream away until your epiglottis turns raw. The only question is, where do you direct your anger? At an IU football team that did the human origami act for the second week in a row? Or at...
Kravitz: No time for Pacers to panic
In the end, it doesn’t really matter if the Indiana Pacers read nursery rhymes to every kid in the city, open soup kitchens and eradicate the H1N1 virus. Yes, they’ve reconnected with the populace and managed to stay off the police...
Kravitz: NFL needs change in attitude on concussions
There are two precious photos affixed to a wall in Dallas Clark’s locker. One is a picture of 7-month-old Dane Clark, his son, his first child, resting comfortably in his crib. The other shows Dallas holding the little man with a lot more...
Pacers in playoffs? Yep, count me in
After a cursory perusal of about a dozen preseason NBA magazines and Web sites, I can tell you that nine of 10 experts — not to mention podiatrists, Wall Street stock traders, plumbers and entomologists — believe the Indiana Pacers will...
Kravitz: It sure is nice to see Sanders walloping opponents again
ST. LOUIS Welcome back, Bob Sanders. And say hello to St. Louis Battering Ram Steven Jackson, the big, bad, nasty running back who has safeties for after-dinner mints. It happened on the Indianapolis Colts’ third defensive play of the game,...
Hall-bound Knight still ignoring IU's invitation
The induction ceremony for Indiana University’s athletics Hall of Fame is Nov. 6. That’s 13 days from now. Everybody on the list has RSVP’d, responded to say they were coming to Bloomington for the occasion, including Steve Downing,...
No winners in Pacers' divorce with Daniels
The first inclination is to look for a Good Guy and a Bad Guy in this messy Indiana Pacers-Mel Daniels divorce. The first instinct is to hail Daniels, the team’s now-former director of player personnel, and slam the Pacers, or defend the Pacers...
Ugly Conseco Fieldhouse rift led to Daniels' departure
The first inclination is to look for a Good Guy and a Bad Guy in this messy Indiana Pacers-Mel Daniels divorce. The first instinct is to hail Daniels, the team’s now-former Director of Player Personnel, and slam the Pacers, or defend the Pacers...
Kravitz: NFL parity is gone, and good riddance
It isn’t dead, but NFL parity sure isn’t feeling all that hot lately. This weekend, the Indianapolis Colts, winners of 14 straight regular-season games, will visit the St. Louis Rams, losers of 16 straight. (If the Colts win 16 straight,...
Let's make a deal? Polian says no
It was roughly three years ago that the Indianapolis Colts pulled off one of those infrequent NFL trade-deadline deals. They sent a second-round draft choice to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers for Anthony “Booger” McFarland, who helped them win...
Since when is not getting blown out OK?
SOUTH BEND, Ind. On the postgame walk from the press box to the interview room, weaving through throngs of exiting Notre Dame fans, this is what I heard over and over and over again: At least we didn’t get blown out. Not exactly "Play like...
Best ever? Colts playing great on both sides of ball
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Is it too early to start the annual debate over whether to play the starters down the stretch or rest them? Maybe that’s presumptuous. Maybe we wait until mid-November to start asking and answering those questions. In...
Garon has his hook, and it's making big plays in Colts offense
First thing, Pierre Garcon had to ask for the cedilla on the name on the back of his jersey. That’s the hook-looking doo-dad at the bottom of the “c” in his name, which, in French, tells the speaker to pronounce the “c”...
Kravitz: Fever deflated for one night, but not defeated
She sat in front of her locker, shoulders slumped, her feet in ice, a look of disbelief etched on her face. Katie Douglas had made those shots so many thousands of times through the years, as a kid on the Far Southside, then at Perry Meridian High...
Kravitz: Sunday of great moments
One team, the Indiana Fever, is on the cusp of a championship, 40 raucous minutes from bringing a WNBA title to this city. The other team, the Indianapolis Colts, are brandishing the early look of a championship contender. Fever, 86-85. It was that...
Imperfect Hoosiers no match for mighty Buckeyes
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — It was 1978, and I was in my freshman year here, double-majoring in punditry and debauchery. Indiana University’s football Hoosiers had just begun the season with a close loss at LSU and an epic victory at Washington,...
Kravitz: Seattle's lime uniforms are just dreadful
The lime was lame. The Day-Glo was heck-no. If the Seattle Seahawks had come out in uniforms that looked like a Jackson Pollock canvas, they would have been more eye-pleasing than those Frankfurt Galaxy-on-acid uniforms they rolled out last Sunday....
Colts look great, but looks can be deceiving
I felt this way about the Indianapolis Colts in 2003. My convictions were strengthened when they put up back-to-back 41- and 38-point playoff performances against Denver and Kansas City. And then they got snowed under in New England. I felt this way...
