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Person A says to B: "I thought you were smarter/stronger/better/more trustworthy than that. I should have known better."
I was thinking it would be termed passive aggressive, but after reading up on it, that doesn't seem right. I'm tripped up on how focused on the Person A the two sentences are. Typically an insult would be "You're not very smart" and that would be that. But this is "I'm disappointed in myself for thinking better of you."
Is there a good term for this sort of insult?
I would suggest insincere self-deprecation. Self-deprecation, by itself means
belittling or undervaluing oneself; excessively modest.
Many discussions of self deprecation, especially when used humorously, suggest that it is often insincere.
Usually when someone says It's not you, it's me they really mean Yes, it's you. Goodbye. Good riddance!
Where will it all end? Will someone else ask how we categorise B's response if he comes back with...
"Don't feel bad. It's entirely my fault. I should have known you'd have unrealistic expectations of me".
Not exactly an established rhetorical/grammatical category, but I'd say they're all examples of...
insincere blame transference
In practice, a very common expression (not limited to OP's "blame transference" context) is...
false modesty - behavior that is intended to seem humble but comes across as fake and unflattering.
Most people commonly use the term double-edged sword for an insult such as this.
