Thanks to everyone for chiming in - I'm happy to be able to share this story and hopefully spread a positive experience to you all!
One other photo I want to share, which really to me captures the importance of baseball, possibly even more than the ones above. And it wasn't even with a Red Sox player.
As the Sox BP was ending, my son wanted to watch the Rockies take some BP. So he went to the edge of the area where he was allowed to watch, and just started watching a bunch of players hit. He had no idea who the Rockies players were, but he just loved watching these giant players hit the ball so far.
Rockies' 1B Daniel Murphy was fielding grounders and saw this, and walked over to talk to Xander. Xander was decked in Sox gear, so he obviously wasn't there to cheer for Colorado, but Murphy wanted to talk to this kid who (literally and figuratively) was looking up to him.
Murphy came over, gave Xander a baseball, and had a conversation about baseball with him. Xander is normally a quiet kid and shy around people he doesn't know, but something about this damn game of baseball turned him into a chatterbox around these players.
I have a posed picture of Xander with Murphy, but prefer this one much better, from a distance - little kid looking up in awe at a real live baseball player, who is spending some time with him.
I think I'm sounding like Terrance Mann here, but it's just something about this damn game of baseball that does it for me. Daniel Murphy of the Rockies - you have two new fans, sir.
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