It is extremely difficult to take on the task of hurting someone’s pride by telling the truth. It can be even harder to do this for a complex organization.

Bureaucratic concerns and hoops often get in the way of true sincerity.

But on Wednesday the Orioles told an important truth to their biggest offseason free agent — and, by extension, themselves. Craig Kimbrel was no longer pitching well enough to keep a spot on the team.

Although it was an admission of a long-arriving conclusion, it felt bold. Kimbrel, 36, is the fifth all-time leader in saves, brought in expressly to cover the Orioles for the 2024 season while Félix Bautista is on the mend from Tommy John surgery. He may be a Hall of Famer one day, and at times he even pitched like a Hall of Famer who probably should have been an American League All-Star.

But no more. After he allowed a career-high six runs (or a career low, depending on how you look at it) in the ninth inning of Tuesday’s 10-0 loss to San Francisco, the Orioles designated Kimbrel for assignment.

They could have gently ushered him out, putting him on the injured list with some sort of phantom soreness. They could have honored his early-season contributions by keeping him on the roster, even if they didn’t think he would turn it around.

But both those moves would have been dishonest, and therefore both would have been the wrong thing to do.

It might have once been unthinkable, but it is undoubtedly the right move for a franchise that needs every arm on the roster helping row toward the postseason. It’s one of the more brassy moves I can remember from GM Mike Elias, and it shows integrity in the organizational approach. It’s not a move that every team has the wherewithal to pull off.

My own experience probably contributes to my surprise that the Orioles did it.

One thing that often frustrated me during my years covering the Los Angeles Lakers was how the organization seemed to care more about perception than substance. This truly came back to bite them after trading for Russell Westbrook, the triple-double king and a future Hall of Famer, who almost immediately underachieved.

The team floundered as it debated how to handle his struggles. Neither the general manager nor the coach had the fortitude to move him to a bench role, even though that was the most obvious place for him. His teammates showed public support for him in the locker room, even as they grumbled at his miscues in other settings. Westbrook got more cross and frustrated as he sensed the words he heard coming from his teammates, coaches and front office didn’t ring with authenticity.

It took more than a year and a half for all parties to finally move on when Westbrook was traded — even though the roster had curdled a long time before then and one of his head coaches had been fired.

This isn’t an apples-to-apples comparison because Kimbrel’s role with the Orioles was smaller than Westbrook’s with the Lakers, and because, for a time, Kimbrel was effective. In the first half of the season, he piled up 23 saves (as many as he had for Philadelphia all of last season, and still tied for 14th most in the league this year) with a 2.80 ERA.

His signing cannot be considered a failure in the sense that Kimbrel’s first half is a big reason the Orioles — for as much as they’ve languished lately — are in position to go to the postseason for the second straight year.

But, after he began to spiral and blow saves in July, the Orioles recognized that the 36-year-old was probably on the decline for good. They moved him out of the closer role and tried to find other ways to use him. It didn’t work, spectacularly so, but the organization gave him a chance to find a role in lower-leverage situations. Kimbrel can’t say it didn’t.

The Orioles exhausted the options for Kimbrel. Then finally, they designated him.

It’s unclear what effect the move has truly had on the clubhouse, but the intended messaging feels straightforward: Earn your keep. The past few weeks of stagnancy reflect a team looking for leadership and urgency. Kimbrel’s exit ought to stir the Orioles up to find both of those things.

Although the recent record of teams colors the public opinion of their decision-makers, a surefire sign of a functional one is that it prioritizes winning over perception. In cutting bait with Kimbrel, the Orioles showed which of those values comes first in Baltimore.