A sports card shop in North Kingstown, Rhode Island pulled the single most sought-after basketball card of the year Monday, cracking open a pack live on YouTube to reveal a 1-of-1 Cooper Flagg Rookie Debut Patch Autograph card that collectors believe could fetch millions at auction. The find has already triggered a bidding war between a top collectibles auctioneer and, remarkably, the Dallas Mavericks themselves, who want their franchise cornerstone's signature card back home.
RhodyBreakers, the livestream card-break arm of Baseball Cards of Rhode Island, opened the pack during a YouTube stream, according to The Dallas Morning News. The shop itself is no newcomer to the hobby — it has operated under the same ownership in Rhode Island since 1988, per RhodyBreakers. The card is a true 1-of-1, featuring an authenticated patch from the debut jersey Flagg wore for his Mavericks debut against the San Antonio Spurs on October 22, 2025, at American Airlines Center, and it carries his signature.
The card comes from 2025-26 Topps Chrome Update Basketball, which Topps released on August 6, marking the company's return to producing NBA cards after a 15-year hiatus, according to Beckett. The set introduced the Rookie Debut Patch program to basketball for the first time, following its 2023 debut in Topps' baseball line. Sports Illustrated reports the release includes 99 total Rookie Debut Patch cards from the 2025-26 season, with 93 featuring autographed redemption vouchers and six patch-only cards for players locked into rival exclusive deals, as detailed by Sports Illustrated.
Flagg Signed and Unveiled the Card Weeks Before It Hit Packs
Flagg himself put pen to the card back on July 17, manually signing the 1-of-1 and unveiling it live on stage at Fanatics Fest NYC in New York City, weeks before Topps ever inserted the redemption voucher into retail packs, according to Sports Collectors Daily. He signed it in front of hundreds of collectors at the convention, the outlet reported.
The buzz around the card is rooted in Flagg's rookie season itself. Selected No. 1 overall by Dallas in the 2025 NBA Draft, Flagg won the 2025-26 Kia NBA Rookie of the Year award and earned a unanimous selection to the NBA All-Rookie First Team after averaging 21.0 points per game, as Hoodline reported in its piece on his unanimous All-Rookie honor. That breakout campaign has fueled speculative projections placing the card's eventual auction price between $1.5 million and $5 million, per the same Sports Illustrated report.
Goldin Offers Cash, Mavericks Counter With Decades of Tickets
Ken Goldin, who owns a collectible auction company, has already offered a $1.5 million cash advance for the card, per a GoldinCo video. Goldin's company expects the card could ultimately fetch upwards of $5 million at auction and plans to auction the card once a deal is reached. Collectibles analyst Geoff Wilson told ESPN in July that Flagg's card would get $5 million.
The Mavericks, however, are trying to keep the card in Dallas with a very different kind of offer. On August 6, the team announced a proposed trade bounty package that includes two lower-level season tickets for 32 years — matching Flagg's jersey number — along with game-worn rookie jersey memorabilia, a Boston road trip, a VIP facility tour, and photo opportunities with the NBA Rookie of the Year and Larry O'Brien trophies, according to Yardbarker.
A Familiar Standoff, With a $366,000 Baseline Already Blown Past
This isn't the first time a team has tried to buy back a superstar rookie's 1-of-1 with experiences instead of cash. In January 2025, an 11-year-old collector rejected a 30-year season ticket offer from the Pittsburgh Pirates for Paul Skenes' 1-of-1 Rookie Debut Patch card, opting instead for the open market — that card later sold at auction via Fanatics Collect for $1.11 million in March 2025, the Associated Press reported.
Before this pull, the highest public sale price for a Flagg card stood at $366,000, paid at Goldin Auctions in July for his 2025-26 Topps Chrome Sapphire Padparadscha Autograph 1-of-1, according to Goldin. For context on how far the top of this market can go, Victor Wembanyama's highest public rookie card sale reached $860,100 at Goldin Auctions in May for his 1-of-1 2023-24 Panini Prizm Nebula Choice Prizm card, per Sports Illustrated.
There's also a less glamorous wrinkle to whichever offer the card's owners choose. Federal income tax regulations treat trading card team bounties — season ticket packages and travel experiences included — as taxable barter exchanges, meaning recipients must report the fair market value of non-cash perks as taxable income, Yardbarker notes. Accepting a 32-year ticket package would trigger an immediate tax bill without providing the cash needed to cover it, a dynamic that has historically pushed collectors toward auction houses over team perks.
Flagg's rise has already made headlines beyond the trading-card world this year, including a June arrest of a Baytown postal supervisor accused of stealing a different high-value autographed Flagg rookie card, underscoring just how valuable his early memorabilia has become. Whether RhodyBreakers takes the Mavericks' ticket bounty or Goldin's cash, the card stands as the newest chapter in a rookie season that already reshaped Dallas's future on the court.
