Did fan really bury Chiefs flag under Raiders’ Allegiant Stadium? There’s a new twist
Gerard DeCosta’s picture has been shared on social media frequently since the Chiefs won Sunday’s AFC Championship Game.
DeCosta is a Chiefs fan who was part of the construction crew that began work on Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas in 2017. He allegedly went to work making sure the Chiefs were a permanent part of the Raiders’ home.
This is from a 2017 Las Vegas Review-Journal story:
A Chiefs fan named Chris Scherzer posted a photo of a man wearing a white hardhat and dark glasses and holding a red and gold Chiefs banner with the inscription “Chiefs Kingdom” on his Facebook page. “Flag buried in dirt, encased in concrete, with a stadium built on top of it,” the message said. “Chiefs 1, Raiders 0. Las Vegas.”
The man with the flag is DeCosta, and when contacted Sunday on Facebook, he said he acted alone in planting the Chiefs flag.
But when asked if he in fact buried the flag in dirt and had it covered with concrete, DeCosta he hedged a bit, saying: “I’m pleading the 5th.”
He’s referring to the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution which means people can refuse to answer questions in order to avoid incriminating themselves.
DeCosta’s coy act came after Chris Maathuis, sports director at KLAS-TV in Las Vegas, spoke with Nevada labor union leader Tommy White about the flag story.
White said after the original photo went viral in 2017, then-Raiders president Marc Badain reached out to White wanting to know if it was true, KLAS-TV reported. White said he contacted DeCosta, who now lives in Hawaii, and got the flag.
“He (DeCosta) just told me the full story about it,” White told KLAS-TV and he displayed the Chiefs flag. “This is his flag. It’s never been buried.”
The story of a buried Chiefs flag has become the stuff of legends, especially since Kansas City has won all four games against the Raiders at Allegiant Stadium.
A Raiders fan playfully pretended to have dug up the flag.
Since the Chiefs booked a spot in Super Bowl LVIII and will be playing at Allegiant Stadium, fans have been sharing that photo of DeCosta with the flag from 2017. He’s become a hero to Chiefs fans, and he’s not quite ready to deny burying the flag.
“The real question is if it was all a hoax,” DeCosta wrote in a Facebook message, “why did it take 7 years to come forward that I gave the flag (to White)? And the Chiefs have never lost there but as soon as the Super Bowl is held there and the Chiefs are playing in it they have it. Just saying.”
The mystery deepens.
This story was originally published January 31, 2024 at 8:13 AM.
