One of sports’ great indignities is the fact that most Hall of Fame-level forefathers earned less in their entire careers than most middle-of-the-road players make today. But for a select few, the post-career rewards can be rich indeed.

Please allow me to introduce you to Arnold Palmer. Oh, you’ve met? Great. Here’s the story. Palmer isn’t just a great golfer, Palmer is a delicious drink — half iced tea, half lemonade — that’s one of the few things you, your father and your grandfather can all enjoy without irony.

And now, it looks like Palmer is starting to really cash in on the drink that bears his name. As CNBC’s Darren Rovell, via Waggle Room, reports, the Arnold Palmer brand, as marketed by the AriZona Beverage Company, is on pace to hit $100 million in sales this year.  According to Rovell, the brand comprises 10 percent of AriZona’s total business but 40 percent of its growth.

Not bad for a drink Palmer reportedly devised in the ’60s, and a business plan crafted 10 years ago on — of course — a cocktail napkin.

And yes, as Waggle Room correctly notes, no post on the Arnold Palmer beverage would be complete without the following:

Sometimes, the game of golf caresses you like a gentle spring breeze. And some days, it leaps up and rips a limb off like a hungry gator. It happens to all of us, even the best of us.

Zach Johnson is the two-time defending champion at the Valero Texas Open, but if he’s going to become the three-time champ, he’s going to need to either play a record-setting round or skip a couple holes. He posted an 8-over 80, bogeying five of seven holes on the front nine. The round was highlit — or, perhaps, lowlit — by a quadruple bogey on the par-3 13th.

Let’s take a moment to consider that quad. Here’s the thing: He was putting for par from 10 feet. He didn’t make it, and he missed and missed and kept on missing. He finally settled for a six-putt. Six! It was the absolute low point on Johnson’s worst professional round in a non-major.

Afterward, Johnson was in no mood for chat. Here’s the entire transcript of his press conference:

Q. Anything in particular that happened?
ZACH JOHNSON: All aspects. Very poor.

Q. You had showed some concern about the course coming in.
ZACH JOHNSON: Wasn’t the golf course. The wind wasn’t severe like it has been. Our rules staff did an awesome job of setting it up. Moved it up a little bit. On the whole they did a great job.

Q. When is the last time you posted this kind of number, do you recall?
ZACH JOHNSON: No.

Q. I was looking –
ZACH JOHNSON: Typically block those numbers out.

Q. I was thinking back as far as I can find. I don’t know the last time I saw it.
ZACH JOHNSON: I don’t know, either.

Q. Tomorrow?
ZACH JOHNSON: Grind. That’s all there is to it.

Oh, but Johnson didn’t card the worst round of the day. That honor goes to Jerry Rice, who recorded a course-record — in a bad way — 92 at the BMW Charity Pro-Am in Spartanburg, S.C. Rice saw Johnson’s quadruple-bogey and raised him two, carding a sextuple-bogey on the par-4 fourth after putting three shots in the water.

"Don’t want to talk about golf," Rice said, getting into his car after the round. "Had enough." Been there, Jerry. Pretty much every week, really.

On the plus side, Rice will get to play three courses before a Saturday cut in the Nationwide Tour event. And he did take time to talk with fans and playing partners, and signed autographs throughout the round, which is nice.

So, keep at it, Jerry. We’re sure you’ll find something you’re good at one of these days.

As the first round of the Texas Open wraps, the scoreboard looks like you’d expect from a lesser PGA Tour event.

A guy named Matt Jones is leading after he broke the course record at TPC San Antonio. Trailing him is Paul Stankowski, J.B. Holmes and a cast of names you may or may not have seen when glancing over the sports page one Saturday morning.

It’s a fine tournament, and one that we enjoy covering, because it’s played in a great city at an excellent venue and usually produces a solid winner (see Johnson, Zach).

All that is fine and dandy, but Thursday reminded us that even after we complain and complain about the likes of a fire hydrant, a neck injury or a hamburger chain, missing out on the controversy can kill a week on the PGA Tour.

While we in the golf business try our hardest to dismiss the notion that Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson are the PGA Tour, it is weeks like this that remind us, "Hey, that might be true."

Sure, we have guys like Holmes, Vijay Singh and John Daly in the field, but that isn’t what tends to drive interest in golf anymore. That lies mostly with what to expect from Woods, with his image drastically changing over the last few months.

We love to anticipate the play of Lefty, who is feast or famine even this late in his career. It is the young guys like Rory McIlroy and Ryo Ishikawa, closing tournaments with numbers most of us hope for on the front nine.

While it is still only the first day of the Texas Open, with 54 holes of great play left to decide a winner, it feels like a down week in golf, and that is to be expected.

Sometimes the biggest story we can find isn’t the one going on inside the ropes.

Less than a month ago, Ken Green returned to the Champions Tour after about the roughest stretch a person can go through. That was a team event. This time, it’s Ken and Ken alone.

Starting Friday, Green will be back on the Champions Tour, teeing it up at the Regions Charity Classic after a year that he will be happy to put behind him.

To recap, Green lost his son, brother and longtime girlfriend, and had to get his right leg amputated after a car accident that claimed two of the three listed along with his dog, Nip, a best friend to Ken.

It will be good to see Ken back out competing, even if he isn’t that concerned about how he plays.

Green admitted that he is nervous on how his leg will handle the 54 hole tournament.

At the Liberty Mutual Legends of Golf in late April, Ken teamed up with Mike Reid to finish tied for 26th after rounds of 67-66-71.

No matter how he finishes, the journey Green has endured has been an incredibly tough one, and I’m sure returning to competitive golf just means that life is finally starting to shape back to as normal as can be expected.

Guys! Perk up! It’s your birthday! Oh, wait … it’s your 40th birthday. Well … cheer up! At least your neck isn’t hurting!

Yes, in one of those merry little coincidences of golf, both celebrated their 40th birthdays on Wednesday. Both guys are one-time major winners, and both guys won their majors within weeks of each other in 2003. They’re two of the four subjects of John Feinstein’s new book "Moment of Glory." (Aside: we’ll have Feinstein on the podcast next week.)

Both Furyk and Weir were among the most exceptional golfers of the 2000s; we listed them at No. 5 and No. 10, respectively, in our best-of-the-decade list.

Furyk is having a solid career resurgence, having won two events this year and sitting 2nd in FedEx Cup points. Weir isn’t faring nearly as well. He’s made seven cuts in 11 events, but his only top-10 is a sixth-place finish at the Bob Hope way back in January.

Still, as Kenny Perry and Vijay Singh have shown, 40 is no longer the finish line to a long and distinguished pro career. Just make sure you guys keep the cakes and candles outside, guys. Don’t want to set off any fire alarms or anything.