Way to go, WTBH! Its hard to be the bearer of embarrassing news, the human in me (and I won't say codie here, because I think its a human trait) did not like to hurt him with the truth.
I, too, took myself out of the middle. After a few of these awkward conversations about so and so and such and such, I started telling people "you tell him that!" and quit participating as the middle man. It has helped tremendously, plus some people haven't spoken to me since and I am grateful for that as well. Boundaries can really weed out the bad stuff!