Josh Beckett only has an inflamed right elbow. Whatever that means. Five seconds after I was given time to digest that news and resume breathing, Terry Francona sent me into a belly laugh for the ages and another bout of oxygen deprivation.

“Awesome,” the Sox skipper said with a sigh.

I guess this means it’s “excellent” that my last violent bout with food poisoning wasn’t indicative of Crohn’s disease. Also, “way cool” that my cardiac arrhythmia is controllable with blood pressure meds and decaf.

While we’re redefining hackneyed expressions, I would humbly submit that the redefining of jobs and pitching responsibilities is destroying baseball.

At no time in the sport’s century-and-a-half history have staff aces been paid so much to do so little. Never before has such a high percentage of those salaries effectively amounted to worker’s compensation.

The shelf life of your team’s frontline pitcher is five years, tops, before he is lying on Dr. Frank Jobe’s operating table with a gas mask across his grill. News of rotator cuff and tendon replacement surgeries has become commonplace as hearing that your little cousin Joey had his appendix removed.

One year ago, we listened to the presupposition that Tom Glavine will be the last pitcher to win 300 games. We accepted it almost without question and with an alarming lack of concern.

Could it be that our over-reactive coddling of pitchers is slowly killing the species?

It’s a minority opinion laughed to scorn in some circles, but treating shoulders and elbows like ceramic vases is what’s causing them to crack.

We’re obsessed with pitch counts.

International youth leagues have imposed ceilings like 24/7 school-zone speed limits, with no consideration of a child’s individual height, weight and arm strength.

Under the guise of protecting their investment, professional franchises won’t let their fastest guns crest 80 pitches if the temperature dips below 60. And barring a perfect game in progress, forget going over the century mark.

Not sure when this madness started, but when all else fails, blame Tony LaRussa.

Somewhere along the way, Mr. Potty Break made it fashionable to bring in Rick Honeycutt for the sole purpose of striking out Alvin Davis. Apparently, The Book noted that Davis batted .121 against left-handers with more than seven letters in their last name during Thursday day games.

Shoot, just last Thursday, Francona clutched The Book in his chaw-stained hands and it cost him dearly.

Soaring pitch total or not, Jon Lester had a 2-0 lead in the seventh inning and an infinitely better chance of coaxing a third out from Jason Giambi than did Hideki “One-Year” Okajima. Yet Francona trotted out Okie and Giambi hit one to Muskogee, saddling Tito’s best healthy starter with a no-decision and swiping away a series sweep of the Yankees.

The Book contains chapter after chapter of anecdotal evidence that young arms can handle only ‘x’ workload and need ‘y’ recovery time.

Well, the proof of that failed mythology may be found in the transaction wire. Marquee names suffering lost-time injuries in record volumes. Stopgap arms holding staffs together.

Nine different starters in a season. Twenty total pitchers. That’s what you get from The Book.

I prefer the history book, which shows me that Josh Beckett has never pitched more than 205 innings in a regular season.

Now, go back to 1980, the year Beckett was born. Steve Carlton, at 35, led the National League with 304 innings. Three. Hundred. Four. He chucked 13 complete games and pitched eight more seasons.

Tommy John tossed 265 innings for the Yankees that year, and it was good only for fifth-most in the American League. Yes, six years AFTER the reconstructive surgery that immortalized his name.

Nobody’s shoulder, elbow and forearm in any era snapped toward the dish more violently than Nolan Ryan’s. Twelve times, Ryan threw more than 220 innings in a season, topping out at 332-plus in 1974.

You couldn’t catch the Express slumming on the disabled list. He never made fewer than 27 starts in a non-strike season from 1970 to 1992.

Pitching coaches and team orthopedists have foretold a self-fulfilling prophecy.

We’ve scared ourselves into an awesome mess. Time to turn back the clock and toughen up.

Kalle Oakes is a staff writer. His e-mail is [email protected].