Victor Wembanyama walked right into it.
The San Antonio Spurs superstar attended Fanatics Fest in New York over the weekend, and the reception was exactly what you would expect from a fan base that just won the franchise’s first NBA title in 52 years by beating him in five games.
Wemby got booed. Wemby got heckled. And one Knicks fan delivered a line that has already gone viral: Jalen Brunson is your dad, Wemby.
To his credit, Wembanyama laughed. What else was he going to do? The Knicks just took him and the Spurs down in the NBA Finals. Jalen Brunson averaged 27 points a game in the series. Karl-Anthony Towns was a monster on the boards. Josh Hart played the best basketball of his life. New York was the better team. It was not close.
Wemby averaged 26 points, 11.2 rebounds, and 3.6 blocks in his first Finals appearance. Those numbers are absurd for a 22-year-old in his fourth NBA season. But the Knicks turned him into public enemy No. 1 in Manhattan the second Game 5 ended, and Fanatics Fest was their first chance to see him in person since the parade.
Some of the trolling was harmless. Chants of Knicks in five every time he was introduced. Custom shirts with the Finals scoreboard on them. Fans holding up Brunson jerseys and pointing at him.
Some of it was rougher. The Jalen Brunson is your dad heckle got the most attention because Wembanyama’s actual reaction was priceless. He put his hands on his knees, doubled over, and laughed. Then he shook his head like a guy who knew this was going to happen and just wanted to get through the weekend.
Give Wemby credit. He did not walk out. He did not get defensive. He did not fire back. He shook hands, took photos with kids, and answered every question the on-stage moderator asked him. If anything, he probably won over some fans on the margins just by handling the room the way he did.
Trae Young was also at Fanatics Fest and joined in on the trolling. The former Knicks villain wore a t-shirt that read Knicks in Five and posed for photos with fans. That is Trae Young, forever a New York troll, doing what Trae Young does best.
For the Spurs, this is just noise. Wemby will be back in the gym in a week. He is still the odds-on favorite for MVP next season. He is still the best young player in basketball. Losing the Finals to the Knicks will fuel him for the next 10 months, and that should terrify the rest of the NBA.
But for one weekend in July, Knicks fans got to be exactly who they are. Loud, petty, and undefeated in 2026.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
