Hall of Fame pitcher Jim Palmer was disciplined by a baseball broadcaster for alleged ‘discrimination’ and ‘workplace misconduct’, a leaked memo reveals.
Palmer, 80, a commentator on the broadcaster for his former team the Baltimore Orioles, was accused of ‘inappropriate, unprofessional, offensive conduct, that negatively impacted another individual who works on Orioles broadcasts’ in the May 2022 memo.
‘As you know, you were accused of workplace misconduct before and during the O’s Xtra pregame show on Saturday, April 23, 2022,’ the memo said.
Though the document itself does not go into further detail about the allegations, texts said to be from Palmer’s wife say he was accused of ‘racism’ against Rob Long, a black colleague at the Mid-Atlantic Sports Network, which covers Orioles and Washington Nationals games.
‘They thought palmer would fall on the sword to protect the O’s from a racially charged lawsuit,’ said the text allegedly from Palmer’s wife Susan, 58, to a former business partner.
It appears Susan sarcastically summed up the memo in her own words, texting her associate that the Orioles were trying to accuse her husband of ‘discrimination of a black man, being unprofessional and creating a hostile, unprofessional work environment.’
Hall of Famer Jim Palmer was accused in a leaked May 2022 memo of ‘inappropriate, unprofessional, offensive conduct’ toward an Orioles broadcast colleague
Texts obtained by the Daily Mail show his wife, Susan, claimed he was accused of ‘racism’ to protect the Orioles from a potential lawsuit involving his black colleague
Rob Long told the Daily Mail that he did not make the discrimination complaint and said he and Palmer are ‘friends’
‘Sign this memo that you’re this horrible person after being part of the O’s team for almost 60 years because we don’t want to be sued by the black man who wants you fired,’ she wrote.
Susan appeared to write in the alleged texts that her husband was ‘fired up’ and ‘agonizing’ over the allegations.
Mid-Atlantic Sports Network, which covers Orioles and Nationals games, kept Palmer’s incident with Long quiet
The memo directed Palmer to re-sign an acknowledgment of MASN’s harassment policy, attend mandatory discrimination or harassment trainings, to promise not to retaliate against any complainants, and to not discuss the case with other MASN staff or contractors – or face ‘termination of your independent contractor agreement’.
The incident at the baseball broadcaster was kept quiet until now and Long and the Palmers appear to have patched things up since.
Contacted by phone, Long told the Daily Mail that he did not make the ‘discrimination’ complaint, that it was ‘misleading’, and added: ‘Jim is my friend.’ He declined to comment further.
The Palmers and Long supported the same charity event earlier this year.
The Baltimore Banner quoted Long and Susan Palmer commenting on their respective adult sons’ autism diagnoses ahead of an autism charity event in April.
The text allegedly from Susan Palmer, states the network thought ‘palmer would fall on the sword’ and stated her husband was ‘FIRED UP as anyone would be’
The memo states that the network’s investigation revealed Palmer had engaged in the ‘inappropriate, unprofessional, offensive conduct’ against a colleague
The memo required Palmer to acknowledge MASN’s harassment policy, attend training, avoid retaliation or discussing the case, or face termination
A representative for the Orioles did not respond to a request for comment.
The Daily Mail obtained the memo and text messages from Palmer’s former business partner, celebrity hairdresser Warren Holmes, who is in a legal dispute with the star pitcher.
Holmes claims Palmer’s wife Susan, who was friends with him at the time, sent him screenshots of the disciplinary memo along with a flurry of angry texts identifying the workplace complaint against her husband as being about ‘racism’.
Jim Palmer sued Holmes in November 2023, claiming the haircare products entrepreneur defrauded the Palmers and defaulted on a $1million loan.
Holmes, whose hairdressing clients have included members of the Royal Family, Rihanna and Kate Moss, filed a shocking $20million counterclaim this year alleging the Palmers threatened to dismember and kill him.
Holmes claims the $1million was an investment in his company, not a loan, and that the breakdown in his relationship with the Palmers was sparked by the alleged ‘racism’ incident at MASN.
‘Jim Palmer, was suspended by MASN Baltimore Orioles for racial discrimination against his colleague Rob Long,’ Holmes wrote in his April 2025 legal filing.
In November 2023, Jim Palmer sued Holmes claiming he defrauded the Palmers and defaulted on a $1million loan after they first invested in his haircare company in 2018
Susan called Holmes ‘Wendell’ in a text, which he claims included a threat to dismember him – cited in his $20million counter filing against Palmer’s $1million lawsuit
He said in the lawsuit that the incident ‘created significant liability’ for his company Loved Brands Inc., forcing him to ask Palmer to step down from the board.
‘The Palmers responded by telling Holmes they would ‘destroy his life,’ triggering their campaign of destruction,’ Holmes wrote in his legal filing.
He says the Palmers befriended him in 2015, invested in his haircare products company, but then became ‘abusive’ and subjected him to a ‘systematic campaign of control and manipulation.’
Holmes claimed in his lawsuit that the pitcher’s wife began sending him flirty texts, and ended up calling and messaging him more than 30 times a day – and even banned the 41-year-old from having girlfriends or tattoos.
The years-long ‘abuse’ allegedly escalated to the couple threatening to ‘destroy his life,’ with Holmes describing in his filing one September 2023 text from Susan – who nicknamed him ‘Wendell’ – as a ‘death threat to dismember him’ into ‘8 f**king parts.’
Jim and Susan Palmer’s lawyer, Michael Sklaire, did not respond to a request for comment about the ‘discrimination’ allegations.
Commenting on the lawsuits earlier this month, Sklaire told told the Daily Mail that Holmes ‘took advantage of a personal relationship with the Palmer family to fraudulently convince them to hand over a significant amount of money.’
‘Instead of defending against those claims that were filed two years ago, Mr Holmes is now attempting to make unsubstantiated and wholly untrue claims to distract from the factual case against him,’ Sklaire said.
‘Mr Palmer looks forward to presenting those facts in court.’
