Searching for information

 

I am clinging to at least four dying sources of information ... some would say "dead" in some cases.

 

I work at a newspaper and still read one virtually everyday. I'm certain half of the current population couldn't tell you what one looked like. I write for a magazine and read that same magazine -- when I have time. Again, half the population would say something like, "my dad used to talk about those."

 

I'm still part of Facebook. I check it maybe every other day just to stay up on the few friends that are still on there. But many, many people deleted that app a few years ago, and again, people in their 20s consider it social media for aunts and uncles. And, finally, I still run a card blog -- and I expect it to supply me with information and entertainment just like all those other "archaic" mediums.

 

But clearly, my expectations are too high. My own blog is probably dying, too. I used to brag about the still-robust reader numbers for years and years. But now with the AI development, I couldn't tell you how many are actually reading. Comments aren't a sure thing either. Card show posts used to be a guaranteed 15 comments even as few as two years ago. My last post illustrates that's not the case anymore (though it's inched closer after a couple of days).

 

But a lot of that is the ego talking, and I can take or leave the numbers when all I want to do is write about cards. My issue today is the current online climate -- with some people on Facebook and some on X and some on Bluesky and some on Instagram and some on YouTube and some on blogs and some on Reddit and some on Discord and some on Mantel and some on Beckett -- in that I cannot find information anymore.

 

Yeah, some of it is you have to hunt around for the right platform to get the info you need, mixing and matching. But also often times it just seems like it plain isn't there. (But there is plenty of misinformation, that's for sure).

 

 

 

As an example, let's look at this 2025 Topps "Flagship Collection" Yoshinobu Yamamoto card. I picked this up recently when ordering the last non-SP 2025 Heritage card that I needed (Corbin Burnes). In an effort to save some dollars I added a couple of Dodgers to the cart and this Yamamoto card was one of them.

 

I specifically picked it because I saw these on the TCDB site and a couple of other places. On TCDB, it is listed with the parallels and inserts and that is what I thought it was initially -- some sort of parallel of the player's flagship card.

 

Then I thought it was an insert. The generic "Flagship Collection" name wasn't helping either, what does that even mean? Somewhere along the way I found out that they were part of release through Costco and things started to clear up. Costco is one of those retail outlets -- like Meijer and Wawa -- that I hear about constantly but don't know because there aren't any around me. I've never been in one. There are two Costcos in Upstate New York, both relatively new and not close.

 

These cards were issued as part of a "Super Box," through Costco that included packs of Topps flagship and Heritage plus 3 "Flagship Collection" packs and one oversized card. Prices seem to range from around $30 to $45.

 

And now, if you had the patience to read through my sleuthing, you know how long it takes these days to get an answer to your question (Another obstacle is Ryan Cracknell is no longer at Beckett and he was a font of information on all the latest product). 

 

If these were called "Costco Flagship Collection" or someone on the card blogs wrote about it, as someone almost always did 15 years ago when a new card product came along, then I could have figured things out quicker. Also, it doesn't help that there are 27 new things associated with flagship this year, who could possible track them all, whether you're a collector or just providing the information?

 

In this whirlwind of bits of information from several scattered sources and no one to pull it together and make sense of it -- unless you want to watch a 26-minute video -- I missed that these "Flagship Collection" cards have been around since 2023, and I actually have a couple of cards from that '23 set.

 

 

My forgetful brain is also contributing to this information crisis.

 

So now that I know what it is and have it in my hands, here is a brief review for anyone else who had been confused (I am aware that 95% of you don't care).

 

-- These cards are thicker than your average base card in 2025. I don't know point-sizes for card stock but they are still thin enough to fit easily in a nine-pocket page, even if you place cards back-to-back.

 

-- As far as feel, they remind me of the early 1980s Perma-graphics cards that were created to resemble credit cards of that time period. They're a bit slick but not shiny like a foil card.

 

-- The bottom part with the player name, team and position and the team logo is shiny though (but still not foil) and you need some light on it to read it.

 

-- The design, as well as the design for the 2023 and 2024 Flagship Collection cards, remind me of the old Trading Card Day card designs, which are not inspired and rather simple, using a couple of geometric shapes before calling it a day.

 

-- There are parallels, of course.

 

These are not appealing enough for me to search out all the Dodgers, I do want them but you can spend money only on so many cards and with the amount of stuff Topps is throwing at you, ignoring half of it is the only way to prevent you from ending up in the funny farm.

 

So I guess what I'm saying is that I would like the information to be out there, in a reliable place that I can consult every time. But I also would like to ignore it at my leisure.