Sportstalkline posted a great article on Danny's life and death. https://sportstalkline.com/the-death-of-danny-diliberto-marks-the-end-of-an-era-in-pool-history/
Sad day indeed
- Thread starter ImaPoolnut
- Start date
Well rats. We knew it was coming but it's sad to say goodbye to such a character. RIP funny man.
This morning the Buffalo News featured a full page editorial obituary honoring Danny DiLiberto and his fantastic life.I put together a wonderful timeline of the past 20 years with Danny, we had some of the best times of my life and I will miss him dearly. Hope your enjoy...
Editor's Pick
Feb. 19, 1935 – Feb. 11, 2025
Greater Buffalo Sports Hall of Fame 2017 inductee Danny DiLiberto.
By Harry Scull Jr./Buffalo News
Danny DiLiberto, who came up from Buffalo’s West Side to become a world champion billiard player four times over, wasn’t allowed to set foot in a pool hall as a kid. His parents forbade it.
Nevertheless, he found the game irresistible, more than baseball, boxing or bowling, the other sports where he excelled.
“His fascination with pool,” Buffalo News sportswriter Bob Feeney observed in 1977, “stems from his older brother’s ability to turn a 9-ball into a $5 bill.”
In the early 1960s, after bowling a 300 game one afternoon at Connecticut Lanes on Connecticut Street, he followed up that night on the third-floor pool tables by running off 200 balls.
It wasn’t long before he hit the road, winning major tournaments, giving exhibitions and playing in money games across the country. He said he once took $1,200 in a game from the legendary Minnesota Fats.
In 1973, the year after he beat the best players in the nation at the fabled “Hustlers Jamboree” tournament in Johnston City, Ill., he told News sportswriter Steve Weller, “I was the top money-winner in the country last year, and I only won $12,000 I could talk about.”
Mr. DiLiberto’s biographer, pool journalist Jerry Forsyth, wrote after his death, “Danny made his living in the local bars and pool rooms. He lived on the edge for much of his life, with his ability to afford dinner and a hotel room often dependent upon his ability to pocket balls earlier in the day.”
It wasn’t until he stepped away from constant competition that he held the closest thing he ever had to a steady job. In 1989, he became a popular commentator for Accu-Stats Video Productions for games on the Pool Network. Teamed with another pro player, Billie Incardona, a longtime friend, he kept at it until 2020.
Inducted into five halls of fame, he died Feb. 11 in a rehabilitation center in Cape Coral, Fla., after a period of declining health. He was nine days short of his 90th birthday.
The son of John DiLiberto, a Teamsters Union member, and Rose DiGiacomo DiLiberto, Daniel Anthony DiLiberto was an outstanding baseball player at Canisius High School, where he graduated in 1952. Renowned for his powerful throws from the outfield, he went on to play Class AA Muny baseball and years later won bets by tossing golf balls across a 330-foot-wide river.
After two years at the University of Buffalo, holding forth at the pool tables in the student union, he went to Florida to break into boxing, which his parents also disapproved. He hooked up with Angelo Dundee, the trainer who later groomed Muhammad Ali.
Fighting under the name Danny “Kid” Toriani, an alias to keep his father from finding out, his secret lasted only until his first bout. Friends of his family in the crowd recognized him. Getting grudging approval from his father, he went undefeated in 14 matches in the lightweight division, winning 12 by knockout, but broke his hands four times and had to give up.
“If it weren’t for his brittle hands,” Dundee told an interviewer, “he would have been a champion.”
Mr. DiLiberto served a stint in the Army and came back to Buffalo. When he won the city pocket billiards tournament in 1961, the sports pages were still calling him a boxer/bowler.
He worked as a bartender, sold kitchenware door to door and conned his way into a draftsman job. He also was the New York State straight pool champion in 1962. Before long, he moved back to Florida.
His first major victory came in the 1963 U.S. Masters Straight Pool championship, which he won again in 1969. After taking the straight pool and all-around championships in Johnston City in 1972, he was ranked among the best.
Through the early 1980s, Mr. DiLiberto won or was runner-up in many state and national tournaments. With his success in one-pocket division of the World Championships of Pocket Billiards in Tampa, Fla., in 1983, he became the first person to win tournaments in four divisions of professional billiards – straight pool, eight-ball, nine-ball and one pocket.
In 1997, he was ranked as the top senior pool player in the world. His last major wins came in the French National Nine Ball Tournament in 1997 and 1998.
He was inducted into the One Pocket Hall of Fame, the Billiard Congress of America Hall of Fame, the Straight Pool Hall of Fame, the Buffalo Boxing Hall of Fame and the Buffalo Sports Hall of Fame.
He was the subject of a Sports Illustrated cover story in 1977. Jerry Forsyth collected his tales in a book, “Road Player: The Danny DiLiberto Story,” published in 2005.
He returned to his hometown regularly for tournaments and exhibitions. One of his appearances pitted him against Buffalo Bills place-kicker John Leypoldt in 1973 in the former Hippodrome Billiard Academy on Main Street. He also coached up-and-coming players, including Stefan Cohen from France, who won the straight pool world championship in 2009.
Survivors include a son, Zack; three daughters, Angela DiLiberto, Amber DiLiberto and Jeanette Fletcher; and six grandchildren. His wife of 29 years, the former Geraldine Meck, died in 2020.
A celebration of his life is being planned for July in Buffalo.
Email danderson@buffnews.com.
Feb. 19, 1935 – Feb. 11, 2025
Danny DiLiberto, 89, rose from West Side to be world champion pool player
- Feb 26, 2025
- 0
Greater Buffalo Sports Hall of Fame 2017 inductee Danny DiLiberto.
By Harry Scull Jr./Buffalo News
Danny DiLiberto, who came up from Buffalo’s West Side to become a world champion billiard player four times over, wasn’t allowed to set foot in a pool hall as a kid. His parents forbade it.
Nevertheless, he found the game irresistible, more than baseball, boxing or bowling, the other sports where he excelled.
“His fascination with pool,” Buffalo News sportswriter Bob Feeney observed in 1977, “stems from his older brother’s ability to turn a 9-ball into a $5 bill.”
In the early 1960s, after bowling a 300 game one afternoon at Connecticut Lanes on Connecticut Street, he followed up that night on the third-floor pool tables by running off 200 balls.
It wasn’t long before he hit the road, winning major tournaments, giving exhibitions and playing in money games across the country. He said he once took $1,200 in a game from the legendary Minnesota Fats.
In 1973, the year after he beat the best players in the nation at the fabled “Hustlers Jamboree” tournament in Johnston City, Ill., he told News sportswriter Steve Weller, “I was the top money-winner in the country last year, and I only won $12,000 I could talk about.”
Mr. DiLiberto’s biographer, pool journalist Jerry Forsyth, wrote after his death, “Danny made his living in the local bars and pool rooms. He lived on the edge for much of his life, with his ability to afford dinner and a hotel room often dependent upon his ability to pocket balls earlier in the day.”
It wasn’t until he stepped away from constant competition that he held the closest thing he ever had to a steady job. In 1989, he became a popular commentator for Accu-Stats Video Productions for games on the Pool Network. Teamed with another pro player, Billie Incardona, a longtime friend, he kept at it until 2020.
Inducted into five halls of fame, he died Feb. 11 in a rehabilitation center in Cape Coral, Fla., after a period of declining health. He was nine days short of his 90th birthday.
The son of John DiLiberto, a Teamsters Union member, and Rose DiGiacomo DiLiberto, Daniel Anthony DiLiberto was an outstanding baseball player at Canisius High School, where he graduated in 1952. Renowned for his powerful throws from the outfield, he went on to play Class AA Muny baseball and years later won bets by tossing golf balls across a 330-foot-wide river.
After two years at the University of Buffalo, holding forth at the pool tables in the student union, he went to Florida to break into boxing, which his parents also disapproved. He hooked up with Angelo Dundee, the trainer who later groomed Muhammad Ali.
Fighting under the name Danny “Kid” Toriani, an alias to keep his father from finding out, his secret lasted only until his first bout. Friends of his family in the crowd recognized him. Getting grudging approval from his father, he went undefeated in 14 matches in the lightweight division, winning 12 by knockout, but broke his hands four times and had to give up.
“If it weren’t for his brittle hands,” Dundee told an interviewer, “he would have been a champion.”
Mr. DiLiberto served a stint in the Army and came back to Buffalo. When he won the city pocket billiards tournament in 1961, the sports pages were still calling him a boxer/bowler.
He worked as a bartender, sold kitchenware door to door and conned his way into a draftsman job. He also was the New York State straight pool champion in 1962. Before long, he moved back to Florida.
His first major victory came in the 1963 U.S. Masters Straight Pool championship, which he won again in 1969. After taking the straight pool and all-around championships in Johnston City in 1972, he was ranked among the best.
Through the early 1980s, Mr. DiLiberto won or was runner-up in many state and national tournaments. With his success in one-pocket division of the World Championships of Pocket Billiards in Tampa, Fla., in 1983, he became the first person to win tournaments in four divisions of professional billiards – straight pool, eight-ball, nine-ball and one pocket.
In 1997, he was ranked as the top senior pool player in the world. His last major wins came in the French National Nine Ball Tournament in 1997 and 1998.
He was inducted into the One Pocket Hall of Fame, the Billiard Congress of America Hall of Fame, the Straight Pool Hall of Fame, the Buffalo Boxing Hall of Fame and the Buffalo Sports Hall of Fame.
He was the subject of a Sports Illustrated cover story in 1977. Jerry Forsyth collected his tales in a book, “Road Player: The Danny DiLiberto Story,” published in 2005.
He returned to his hometown regularly for tournaments and exhibitions. One of his appearances pitted him against Buffalo Bills place-kicker John Leypoldt in 1973 in the former Hippodrome Billiard Academy on Main Street. He also coached up-and-coming players, including Stefan Cohen from France, who won the straight pool world championship in 2009.
Survivors include a son, Zack; three daughters, Angela DiLiberto, Amber DiLiberto and Jeanette Fletcher; and six grandchildren. His wife of 29 years, the former Geraldine Meck, died in 2020.
A celebration of his life is being planned for July in Buffalo.
Email danderson@buffnews.com.
I apologize for the previous posts that had links to this obituary. It appears the Buffalo news charges a subscription to read their articles online. I already subscribe so here is the article in full.
