AJ Dybantsa's Flagship rookie is a great raw play before the slabs pile up

AJ Dybantsa's first Topps Flagship rookie, 2026-27 Topps Flagship Basketball #256, came out today, days after he scored a career-high 21 points in 33 minutes of a 103-94 win at Orlando in only his third NBA game. It's his first Flagship rookie, not his first rookie card, since Topps Now printed a draft-night Dybantsa back in June.

Last year's class already showed how this goes. Cooper Flagg's 2025-26 Topps Flagship rookie #201 was the card everybody chased and then mailed to PSA in stacks. PSA has graded 44,619 of them and 14,664 came back a 10. Nothing about Flagg got worse. There are just so many perfect copies of the same card that the supply of PSA 10's is inflated and only sells for about $100.

To be fair to the slab, play can still move it. Of the Flagship rookies of Flagg, Dylan Harper, VJ Edgecombe and Kon Knueppel, Harper's #202 is the only one whose PSA 10 went up this year. The Flagship logo carries weight too. Flagg's Flagship PSA 10 still sells for more than his 2024 Bowman Chrome University PSA 10 ($100 against about $70 in October) and sold more than five times as often.

Dybantsa's base prospect card shows how cheap a common chrome rookie gets. His 2025 Bowman Chrome 1st Bowman #BCP-1 sells for under $2 raw, cheaper than a gas station coffee. The money in his prospect cards sits in the auto, whose PSA 10 went for $560 on Oct. 22.

I'd buy a clean raw #256 for around $8 this week and skip the slab. PSA's Value tier costs $40 a card while Flagg's Flagship came back a PSA 10 about one time in three. That's about $50 for a one-in-three shot at a slab I expect to be as common as Flagg's. If Dybantsa keeps putting up 21-point nights, the raw copy rides along for less than a pizza.