Pinky Silverberg

Pinky Silverberg (April 5, 1904 – January 16, 1964) was a Connecticut-based American boxer who briefly held the National Boxing Association (NBA) World Flyweight title in late 1927.

Pinky Silverberg was born into a Jewish family in the Bronx on April 5, 1904.

He would eventually become one of six siblings, with three other boys and two girls.

His father relocated to Ansonia, Connecticut, in 1920 to find work in one of the many factories in the Naugatuck Valley.

Silverberg began his career in 1920 when he was only 16 by adding two years to his age so he could begin boxing professionally.

His older brother Herman, who may have influenced his choice to be a boxer, was also a featherweight known as "Kid Silvers" and fought feature bouts in New York boxing clubs.

Between September 1920, and June 1925, Pinky fought twenty-seven bouts almost exclusively in the Connecticut area, losing only three, and winning fourteen, with three by knockout.

The nine draws among his initial bouts indicated that his rise to prominence was gradual but that he learned from these bouts and over time improved his technique.

Adding to the confusion, there was no single organization at the time that sanctioned a World Flyweight Champion, and in the 1920s over a dozen World Flyweight Champions were recognized by the New York State Athletic Commission (NYSAC), and the European Boxing Union (EBU).

Though he would meet a few of the era's greatest boxers near his weight class, Silverberg would never have the opportunity to fight in a title bout again.

Silverberg took the Connecticut Flyweight Championship on October 17, 1925, against Al Beuregard at the Opera House in Ansonia, Connecticut, in a ten-round points decision.

The important win heralded his emergence as a potential flyweight contender.

With an efficient defense, Silverberg was knocked out only once in his career by Willie LaMorte in 1926.

His managers were Johnny Herman, Lou Anger, and Joe Smith.

Problems with his hands, which were often broken during his career, may have hampered many of his boxing performances.

In what may well have been his only loss by knockout, on April 5, 1926, Silverberg lost to accomplished boxer Willie LaMorte at Footguard Hall in Hartford, Connecticut, in a difficult bout lasting only three rounds.

On January 27, 1926, Silverberg first met Ruby (Dark Cloud) Bradley in Hartford, Connecticut losing in an eight-round points decision.

In a close bout, the hometown paper, the Hartford Courant, questioning the decision, wrote, "Silverberg outsmarted Bradley, he carried the fight to Bradley and his punches were straighter and truer, he looked good to everybody except the third man in the Ring (referee)."

Ruby Bradley was a talented flyweight boxer who had taken the New England Flyweight Championship in late 1926, but likely not the best known or highly reputed boxer Silverberg would face in his career.

Bradley would never take a world title, and contend only once for the NYSAC Flyweight Championship unsuccessfully later in his career.

Fighting at only 113 pounds, on January 19, 1927, Silverberg lost to black Cuban boxer Eladio Valdes known as Black Bill at the Walker Athletic Club in New York in a six-round points decision.

The bout was a benefit for the great black boxer Sam Langford.

Silverberg won the NBA World Flyweight Championship vacated by Fidel LaBarba, who had recently retired, by defeating Ruby "Dark Cloud" Bradley in Bridgeport, Connecticut on October 22, 1927, when Bradley was disqualified for delivering a low blow to Silverberg in the seventh round.

Silverberg was unable to continue the bout due to the injury.

Some boxing officials may have felt that Silverberg's title was not as fully justifiable due to his win by disqualification, though the World Championship Title belt was presented to Silverberg officially by the NBA commissioner a few weeks after his win.

Silverberg met Bradley again on December 3, 1927, in a fateful match that was contested above the flyweight limit at the State Armory in Bridgeport, Connecticut, and was therefore not a title bout.

Bradley beat him in a ten-round unanimous decision.

Only a few days after the match, the President of the NBA stripped Silverberg of the title for an "unsatisfactory showing" in the bout.

As a boxing historian later put it, "it remains the only time in boxing history that a champion was shorn of a legitimately won championship due to a poor performance in a non-title bout."

It is important to note that Silverberg was boxing with a broken hand in the bout which hampered his performance, adding to the injustice of stripping him of his title.

After his loss to Bradley, Silverberg began boxing exclusively as a bantamweight at a weight range of 112 to 118 pounds.

Apparently LaMorte had Silverberg down cold, as Pinky lost to LaMorte again on June 25, 1928, at Laurel Garden in Newark, New Jersey in a ten-round points decision.

According to the Newark Star-Eagle, LaMorte floored Silverberg in the first round, taking all but two of the rounds in the bout.

Silverberg would lose to Black Bill again in a six-round points decision on December 29, 1928, at the Olympia Athletic Club in New York.

The poster of Silverberg at right, published around 1928, shows his new status as a bantamweight contender, and lists many of the boxers he met formerly as a flyweight.

Due to a power struggle within the organization's hierarchy, the NBA never achieved a consensus to restore the championship to Silverberg.

At 116 pounds, on July 24, 1928, Silverberg lost to Norwegian Pete Sanstol at Queensboro Stadium in Queens, in a six-round points decision.

A noteworthy black Cuban flyweight at the time, Black Bill would later contend for the NYSAC World Flyweight Championship in March 1930 against Midget Wolgast.

Bradley was a top Black flyweight contender who was rated as the third best flyweight in the world by Ring Magazine in 1931.

An accomplished opponent, Sanstol would later take the World Bantamweight Championship on May 20, 1931, against Archie Bell in Montreal.