By Tom Orsborn, Staff Writer | San Antonio Express-News (SAEN), 2026-04-28 14:12:10
2015年10月20日，在AT&T中心球馆马刺对阵菲尼克斯太阳队的比赛中，西班牙语广播员保罗·卡斯特罗在看台层的解说席进行现场解说。
20世纪80年代后期，当保罗·卡斯特罗 (Paul Castro) 接受俄勒冈州伍德本一家广播电台的工作邀请时，他并不知道这将是他成为NBA历史上任职时间最长的西班牙语电台广播员之一的第一步。
“我看着镜子里的自己，问自己：‘我是怎么走到这一步的？’”他说。
现年64岁的卡斯特罗目前正处于他为KXTN电台解说马刺比赛的第32个赛季，最近他一直在思考自己是如何从一名广播音乐和谈话节目的新手，成长为NBA的一棵常青树。
随着马刺队在季后赛首轮对阵波特兰开拓者队，卡斯特罗最近一直在回忆自己职业生涯的起点也就不足为奇了。他在俄勒冈州长大，在1994年加入马刺队之前，曾为开拓者队担任了四个赛季的西班牙语比赛解说。
“这是一段伟大的旅程，但我从未梦想过自己会走上这条路，”他上周末在波特兰的球队酒店里说道。马刺队在那里的七场四胜制系列赛中赢下了两场，在周二晚上回到弗罗斯特银行中心 (Frost Bank Center) 进行第五场比赛前，取得了3-1的领先。
作为俄勒冈州立大学广播媒体专业的学生，卡斯特罗曾想导演音乐录影带。
“我当年非常喜欢MTV，”他说，“它真的启发了我。我热爱音乐，热爱影像。我当时想：‘这就是我想做的事情。’”
但他的计划在某个夏日发生了改变，当时他正和哥哥何塞 (Jose) 在家乡伍德本参加一场公园娱乐排球锦标赛。伍德本是一座拥有约3万人口的城市，位于波特兰以南约30英里处。
“我和我哥哥都不害羞，”卡斯特罗在2015年接受《圣安东尼奥快报》采访时说道，“我们会和每个人聊天，总是交朋友、帮助别人。所以在比赛前我们正在和这些人聊天，突然间，我们听到这家伙说：‘你知道吗？你们话太多了。’”
“我们转过身，看到这个高个子，我们心想：怎么了？”卡斯特罗说。
那个“高个子”是克里夫·佐纳 (Cliff Zauner)，他是伍德本一家AM广播电台的老板，该电台计划采用西班牙语格式，以适应当地不断增长的拉丁裔人口。
“我想让你上电台，”佐纳对这两兄弟说。他们是何塞和塞巴斯蒂安娜·卡斯特罗 (Sebastiana Castro) 夫妇的12个孩子之一（包括9个姐妹），这对移民劳工夫妇居住在墨西哥的圣米格尔德阿连德，距离墨西哥城西北约四小时车程。
“我告诉他：‘什么？我们从来没做过广播，’”卡斯特罗说，“他告诉我们：‘别担心。明早给我打电话。’这件事就这么出人意料地发生了。”
佐纳很快决定，他想用西班牙语直播开拓者队的比赛，并让卡斯特罗担任现场解说。
“我告诉他：‘克里夫，我才刚开始做广播。我做不了现场解说，’”卡斯特罗回忆道，“他说：‘你能行。我以前做过（冰球和棒球的）现场解说，没那么难。只要看几场比赛，给我录个磁带，我会寄给开拓者队。’”
卡斯特罗在对着电视解说比赛时，用磁带录下了他的试音。这让他赢得了这份工作。几个月后，他就在解说1990年西部半决赛波特兰开拓者对阵马刺队的系列赛了。
当时的马刺队由拉里·布朗 (Larry Brown) 执教，格雷格·波波维奇 (Gregg Popovich) 和 R.C. 布福德 (R.C. Buford) 担任助教。马刺队拥有当年的最佳新秀、状元秀大卫·罗宾逊 (David Robinson)，另一位优秀新秀、探花秀肖恩·埃利奥特 (Sean Elliott)，以及球风强硬的两届全明星球员特里·卡明斯 (Terry Cummings)。但由克莱德·德雷克斯勒 (Clyde Drexler) 领衔的开拓者队在特里·波特 (Terry Porter) 砍下36分的带领下，在加时赛中以108-105赢下了抢七大战，为这轮令人难忘的系列赛画上了句号。
“那是特别的一年，”卡斯特罗说，“这有点疯狂，因为那是将近36年前的事了。”
卡斯特罗在开拓者队的任期在四年后结束，当时球队停止了西班牙语广播。他认为自己在NBA的时光已经结束，曾考虑搬到洛杉矶去读电影学院。
“我从未想过把这当作一份职业，”他说，“我当时实际上正在填写去洛杉矶导演学校进修的申请表。”
就在那时，马刺队打来了电话。
“当我听到‘嘿，这里是马刺队。我们有兴趣和你谈谈’时，我以为是我的朋友在恶作剧，”卡斯特罗说，“我说：‘行了，别逗了。’”
2015年10月20日，在AT&T中心球馆马刺对阵菲尼克斯太阳队的比赛中，电台广播员保罗·卡斯特罗在球馆上方的解说席进行直播。
这么多年过去了，卡斯特罗上周末回到了波特兰，回到了他那段不可思议旅程开始的地方。在比赛间隙，他探望了家人，回想起他们在俄勒冈州长大的所有美好时光。
“我怀念滑雪，怀念滑水。当然，我也想念我的家人，”他说，“夏天的时候，我们几乎整天都在河边，直到太阳下山。冬天我们会去胡德山 (Mount Hood) 滑雪。一旦你进入大山，你就不想下来。波特兰一直是一座伟大的城市。”
但现在，他的生活重心全在马刺队和圣安东尼奥。
“我把共事的同事视为我的第二个家庭，”卡斯特罗说，“我们一起旅行，待在一起。事实上，前几天我在热身期间看到（马刺队管理合伙人）彼得·J·霍尔特 (Peter J. Holt) 独自坐在场边，于是我走过去和他聊天。我告诉他：‘多年前，当你父亲（前马刺队管理合伙人彼得·M·霍尔特 (Peter M. Holt)）和你一起来看季后赛时，你才这么高，而现在你已经是掌门人了。’我以前经常和他父亲聊天，现在彼得已经是一个有了自己家庭的成年人，并执掌大局。”
卡斯特罗在这个春天享受着创造新的季后赛回忆的乐趣。
“这就像是再次结束退休状态，重新开始，一切都是新鲜的，”在缺席七年后再次参与季后赛工作，他这样评价道，“这让我想起了过去的日子，只是现在都是新面孔了。”
由生成式人工智能翻译，译文内容可能不准确或不完整，以原文为准。
点击查看原文：Spurs Spanish radio voice Paul Castro reflects on improbable journey
Spurs Spanish radio voice Paul Castro reflects on improbable journey
Spanish language broadcaster Paul Castro calls the game from his balcony level perch as the Spurs host the Phoenix Suns at the AT&T Center on October 20, 2015.
When Paul Castro accepted a job offer from a radio station in Woodburn, Oregon, in the late 1980s, he had no idea it would be the first step in a journey toward becoming one of the longest-tenured Spanish-language radio broadcasters in NBA history.
“I see myself in the mirror and I ask myself, ‘How did I get here?’” he said.
Now in his 32nd season calling Spurs games for KXTN, Castro, 64, has been thinking a lot lately about his improbable rise from a neophyte radio music and talk show host to an NBA fixture.
With the Spurs facing the Portland Trail Blazers in the first round of the Western Conference playoffs, it’s no surprise Castro has been reminiscing lately about his start in the business. He grew up in Oregon and spent four seasons announcing games in Spanish for the Trail Blazers before joining the Spurs in 1994.
"It’s been a great road, but I never dreamed I would be on it,” he said last weekend at the team hotel in Portland, where the Spurs won two games in the best-of-seven series to take a 3-1 lead entering Game 5 Tuesday night at the Frost Bank Center.
As a student studying broadcast media at Oregon State, Castro wanted to direct music videos.
“I loved MTV back in the day,” he said. “It really inspired me. I loved music. I loved video. And I thought to myself, ‘That’s what I want to do.’”
But his plans changed one summer day while playing in a parks and recreation volleyball tournament with his brother Jose in their hometown of Woodburn, a city of about 30,000 about 30 miles south of Portland.
“My brother and I, we aren’t shy,” Castro told the San Antonio Express-News in a 2015 interview. “We would talk to everybody, always making friends, helping people out and stuff. So we were talking to these guys before our match and then all of a sudden, we hear this guy say, ‘You know what? You guys talk too much.’”
“We turned around and we saw this tall guy and we were like, What’s up?” Castro said.
The “tall guy” was Cliff Zauner, owner of an AM-radio station in Woodburn that planned to adopt a Spanish format to accommodate the area’s growing Latino population.
“I’d like to have you on the radio,” Zauner told the brothers, who were among 12 children, including nine sisters, born to migrant workers Jose and Sebastiana Castro in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, about a four-hour drive northwest of Mexico City.
“I told him, ‘What? We’ve never done radio,’” Castro said. “And he told us, ‘Don’t worry about it. Call me in the morning.’ Out of the blue that happened, just like that.”
Zauner soon decided he wanted to air Trail Blazers games in Spanish with Castro doing the play-by-play.
“I told him, ‘Cliff, I just started in radio. I can’t do play-by-play,’” Castro recalled. “He said, ‘You can do it. I used to do play-by-play (hockey and baseball) and it isn’t that hard. Just watch some games, give me a tape and I’ll send it to the Blazers.’”
Castro recorded his audition on a cassette tape while calling a game off TV. It won him the job, and months later, he was working a playoff series that pitted Portland against the Spurs in the 1990 Western Conference semifinals.
Coached by Larry Brown, with Gregg Popovich and R.C. Buford among his assistants, the Spurs boasted the rookie of the year in No. 1 overall pick David Robinson, another outstanding rookie in No. 3 overall pick Sean Elliott and a tough-minded two-time All-Star in Terry Cummings. But the Clyde Drexler-led Blazers won the seventh and deciding game 108-105 in overtime behind Terry Porter’s 36 points to cap a memorable series.
“That was a special year,” Castro said. “It’s kind of crazy because that was almost 36 years ago.”
Castro’s stint with Portland ended after four years when the team halted its Spanish broadcasts. Thinking his time in the NBA was over, he considered moving to Los Angeles to attend film school.
“I never thought about making this a career,” he said. “I was actually filling out my paperwork to go to directing school in L.A.”
That’s when the Spurs called.
“I thought it was my friends cranking me when I heard, ‘Hey, this is the Spurs. We’d be interested in talking to you,’” Castro said. “I go, ‘Yeah, right.’”
Radio broadcaster Paul Castro goes on the air from his perch above the arena as the Spurs host the Phoenix Suns at the AT&T Center on October 20, 2015.
All these years later, Castro was back in Portland last weekend where his unlikely journey began. In between games, he visited family and thought back to all the good times they had growing up in Oregon.
“I miss snow skiing. I miss water skiing. And, of course, I miss my family,” he said. “In the summers, we were on the river almost all day until the sun went down. And in the winter we would go to Mount Hood, do a lot of skiing. Once you’re in the mountains, you don’t want to come off. And Portland’s always been a great city.”
But now he’s all about the Spurs and San Antonio.
“I consider the people I work with as my second family,” Castro said. “We travel together, we stay together. As a matter of fact, I saw (Spurs managing partner) Peter J. Holt on the floor the other day sitting by himself during warmups, so I came down to talk to him. I told him, ‘When your dad (former Spurs managing partner Peter M. Holt) and you would come to the playoffs years ago you were this high, and now you are in charge.’ I would talk to his dad all the time, and now Peter is a grown man with his own family and in charge.”
Castro is having fun this spring making new playoff memories.
“It’s like coming out of retirement again and starting all over again all fresh,” he said of working in the postseason after a seven-year absence. “It reminds me of the old days, but it’s all new people.”
By Tom Orsborn, Staff Writer, via San Antonio Express-News