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Patrick McNeill Capitals jersey - any Caps fans out there, help?


DiscoStu

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So as a Saginaw Spirit season ticket holder from the beginning and a jersey collector, a clearance item on Meigray caught my eye. Specifically, this:

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I have seen pictures of him from preseason games in 2011-12 wearing a jersey that doesn't have his first initial, and I have seen game ready jerseys from 2012-13 that did not have his first initial, so it had me wondering, where does this jersey come from? A rookie tournament? Training camp? I can't find another McNeill who played for the Caps.

If anyone who follows the Caps can shed some light on this situation, that would be swell.

Edited by DiscoStu
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Update -- I never thought to scan the Hershey roster for other McNeills, so I had a look and found a Grant McNeill -- I suppose he may have also found his way into a Capitals preseason game, thus necessitating the first initials. Would anyone happen to know which preseason that would have been?

Update again -- It looks like both McNeills were invited to training camp in both 2009 and 2010.

My current guess is that he wore it in this game:

http://capitals.nhl.com/gamecenter/en/boxscore?id=2009010036

Unfortunately, no photos of him with the "P. McNeill" from that game.

Edited by DiscoStu
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Looks like Grant McNeill was in camp with the Capitals in 2008: http://www.cbssports.com/nhl/players/playerpage/273545/grant-mcneill. Patrick McNeill would have been in camp too.

The rookie game with the Flyers that year was played in red jerseys at home. My guess is that the Caps had GI's made up that year for both McNeill's that year, so this is why the initial.

So my bet is this is a 2008 GI.

I would note that I just bought two of these clearance Caps jerseys, that I'm pretty sure were worn in that 2008 rookie game (Dovgan & Lacroix). It looks like Meigray had some Caps jerseys from that year that were not officially entered in the Meigray system.

Hope this helps.

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Okay, maybe not. P. McNeill appeared in a home preseason game in 2008 wearing #75: http://www.nhl.com/gamecenter/en/boxscore?id=2008010029

So either this is a 2008 GI with a different number, or a subsequent season. I owned a preseason P. McNeill #46 for a while (I forget the season or if it had an initial).

So it appears that I am no help at all........sorry.

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Further confusing the issue is this 2010 Caps training camp roster, with GRANT McNeill wearing # 75 http://capitals.nhl.com/v2/ext/TrainingCampRoster.pdf...............so maybe that was actually G. McNeill playing in that preseason game in 2008.

So I'm back to 2008 GI as my best guess, as this 2008 training camp roster has P. McNeill as #46 http://capitals.nhl.com/club/news.htm?id=462794.

I can't find him in any 2008 preseason games now, assuming that it is actually Grant McNeill in that one preseason game.

90% sure it's 2008 GI.

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I see that it is gone from Meigray clearance. Did you buy it?

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Yes. Patrick McNeill was at 2008 rookie camp, I'm not sure if he was at the main camp. It is possible that they made up a jersey for him in the 2008 preseason and it wasn't used, or it could be the jersey he wore in that one 2009 preseason game in Chicago.

I also note that I am forgetting about vector/wordmark. According to nhluniforms.com, the switch to wordmark happened in 2011-12, and the jersey above is a 2.0. So that rules nothing out and still means that this jersey could have been for 2008 or 2009 preseason.

Edited by DiscoStu
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Okay, one last thought. Looks like both Grant and Patrick were in camp in 2008, 2009 and 2010. In the 2009-2010 and 2010-2011 Meigray Population Reports, the McNeill jerseys are in there (GI, TC, or preseason). In the 2008-2009 Pop Rept, neither McNeill is in there, although we know that both were in camp, and P. McNeill was under contract (I believe).

Given that I believe most of these Caps clearance jerseys are from 2008-2009, and there is no McNeill in the Pop Rept, I think this is a 2008 GI that didn't get full Meigray documentation, like the TC/Rookie game jerseys I bought.

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Yes. Patrick McNeill was at 2008 rookie camp, I'm not sure if he was at the main camp. It is possible that they made up a jersey for him in the 2008 preseason and it wasn't used, or it could be the jersey he wore in that one 2009 preseason game in Chicago.

I also note that I am forgetting about vector/wordmark. According to nhluniforms.com, the switch to wordmark happened in 2011-12, and the jersey above is a 2.0. So that rules nothing out and still means that this jersey could have been for 2008 or 2009 preseason.

Nope, that 2009 preseason white jersey is Meigray documented as G05074 in the population report,

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Cool. Then this jersey was worn in the Traverse City rookie tournament?

Edit-- nope, Washington wasn't there.

http://www.hockeysfuture.com/articles/10536/2008_traverse_city_prospects_tournament_day1/

Caps play one rookie game per year against the Flyers. 2008 was in the home reds.

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Still think it is a 2008 GI.

Full Caps training camp started 9/20. P. McNeill was sent to Hershey 9/22. http://blog.pennlive.com/patriotnewssports/2009/09/washington_capitals_reassign_s.html

Given that, and the obvious holes in the 2008 Meigray documented jerseys, I'm moderately confident that it is a 2008 GI.

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LetsGoCaps -- were those Caps' shirts you bought on Clearance 1.0s or 2.0s?

They are 2.0's.

Edited by LetsGoCaps
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I just went through hundreds of photos from a Flyers/Caps rookie game that I shot where the Caps are wearing their home whites... Sorry to say, I came up with nothing.

Yep, everything points to it being a 2008-2009 GI that somehow fell outside of the stringent Meigray documentation standards, like many of the other recent Meigray "Clearance" Caps jeresys.

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It could have been made up for a fall 2008 public relations event....."Meet the Caps Rookies at Walmart" or some such thing. Either way, it is from the team and Patrick may or may not have ever worn it even for an off ice thing but for the price I don't really care.

Thanks for checking, though, it is really cool that you did that.

Edited by DiscoStu
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