Barry Tompkins: Shohei who, bacalhau, and a simple request

Being in the business of sports, it’s always been a dilemma as to when was the best time to take a vacation. I couldn’t do it in the winter because of basketball, or the spring because of baseball, and of course the fall was out because football took precedence over personal pleasure.

There was a teeny-tiny window after the NCAA Final Four and before baseball really took hold (I know the NBA was going on, but it was always in its mid-season dullness), but generally the weather was somewhere between tepid and chilly unless we decided to go to Tierra del Fuego, or some other Southern Hemisphere hot spot.

So this year we took a leap of faith and we came to Portugal during the World Series. Relying solely on intuitive knowledge that our San Francisco Giants’ players would be happily scattered amongst many golf courses and, when they weren’t working on their short game, would be consumed with the babysitting chores they’d avoided all season.

The World Series was just a part of growing up. Even if your team wasn’t playing, it was must see TV. So here I am in Coimbra, Portugal where EuroSport is chock full of the local version of football (which actually almost exclusively involves a foot), when it isn’t filling the airwaves with snooker or darts – both of which are born of a background of chugging beer and smoking Dunhills.

What I can’t find is any semblance whatsoever of what’s been transpiring at Dodger or Yankee Stadium. The good people of Portugal have innate knowledge of Cristiano Ronaldo’s every move even though his movement on a soccer pitch is confined to Saudi Arabia where the world’s greatest soccer (football) player plies his trade for a salary that could probably buy him a relatively large portion of this country.

Here’s what else they know: Codfish. Codfish is to the Portuguese what apple pie is to middle America. It is on every menu in the country for every meal. It is grilled, fried, boiled, breaded, baked, sauteed and poached – sometimes all at once. It is topped with everything from cheese and tomatoes to ice cream. This country’s love affair with the fish goes back as far as the explorer Vasco da Gama, who asked his ship’s caterer to be sure and stock the galley with something that won’t get moldy by the time the boat reaches the Azores on its journey to the new world.

“You just take a cod and bury it in salt for a couple months and we’ll call it bacalhau,” was the suggestion, and DeGama said, “lay it on me.” Three things happened. One, the crew survived, but stayed in the new world just so they could get something else to eat. Two, the caterer became the country’s first celebrity chef and made bacalhau a national dish. And three, there is no codfish in Portuguese waters but the Norwegians have made a killing selling it to Portugal.

And here’s the irony. Neither the Portuguese nor the Norwegians care one iota about the World Series.

… And then there’s Steph Curry

So, while Aaron Judge or Shohei Ohtani could stroll down the street in any city in Portugal and not so much as draw a second glance, there is one guy who everybody from the kid wearing a Benfica tee-shirt dribbling a soccer ball in a dirt playground to the lady selling pastries on the corner knows, and that’s that guy Steph Curry.

I couldn’t get anyone to tell me who won the first five games of the World Series without reading it online, but before Steph Curry got so much as an MRI on his ankle, every merchant in the old city was asking if he was going to be OK?

If soccer was not king here and Ronaldo suddenly got a disabling bunion, the prime topic of sports conversation, I feel certain, would center around the NBA.

Even here in this country where the game hasn’t taken hold like it has in other European countries, it’s still a known commodity. Significantly, the average height of a Portuguese man is just a tad over 5’7”. That would have a profound effect on developing home grown future NBA players.

Although on a personal note I might have had a career in hoops had I been raised here. As an adult I would still be able use my cat-like, back-to-the basket moves that I had as a 5’7” center on the Presidio Junior High School squad as a 12 year old. Sadly, as a 14 year old everybody in my class, including the school mascot, had shot past me, and my dreams of a career as an NBA big man were shattered.

Had I only of been born in Portugal.

And finally, a simple request from a man who is desperately seeking the best Chinese food in Portugal just so he doesn’t have to face another codfish. After you read this, jot me a note and let me know who won the World Series.

Barry Tompkins is a 40-year network television sportscaster and a San Francisco native.  Email him at barrytompkins1@gmail.com.