Ben Stiller Criticized Pat McAfee’s “Weird” Comments About Him, Timothée Chalamet, And Spike Lee

At least one of the trio of native New Yorkers has been present at nearly every game of the Knicks’ run to the Eastern Conference finals, bringing with them next-level enthusiasm, great fits, and occasionally some super famous friends (Kendall and Kylie Jenner, I’m talking about you).

And while most fans appear to be loving the dedication, it seems Ben, Timothée, and Spike weren’t made to feel so welcome when they visited Indianapolis earlier this week to watch the Knicks take on the Indiana Pacers in front of their home crowd.

At the beginning of the game, sports pundit and Pacers fan Pat McAfee took a moment to do some trash-talking, taking aim at the “bigwigs from the big city” sitting courtside. Hyping up the home crowd, he yelled into the mic: “Spike Lee is here. Ben Stiller is here. Timothée Chalamet is here. Let’s send these sons of bitches back to New York with their ears bleeding!”

As you’d probably imagine, each name was met with increasingly intense boos from the Indiana crowd. While we all love a bit of playful trash-talk in sports, this felt a little mean-spirited — and it seems Ben agrees.

Responding to a video of the moment on X, Ben replied: “Yes. Weird. We were happy to be there and cheer our team and other than that Indy fans were awesome,” adding in another response: “No bitterness at all Indy fans were amazing good win for you guys.”

Replying to another fan who said that Pat’s moment “pissed [them] off so much,” Ben further explained his confusion, also emphasizing that he still had a great time. “He must be playing around – if it’s an actual point of view it seems a little anachronistic or cliche?” he wrote of Pat. “Like we are ‘big city celebs’ and we shouldn’t be there in the heartland? 😂Again, everyone we met was awesome and incredibly cool.”

Before long, Pat caught on to criticism from people calling him “classless” and spoke out to set the record straight. “These guys are all front row, they’re a part of the show,” he said on his show on May 28, admitting that “sons of bitches” was perhaps not the best term he could’ve picked. “I would like to let them all know, mad respect for coming out. Mad respect for the amount of support they’re showing the Knicks. All love.”

And for what it’s worth, Ben cleared the air from his side, too, suggesting that Pat ought to come to Game 5 at Madison Square Garden later today.