Well, that's a great thread. I read most of the posts today and I wanted to share opinion about some of the discussions.
First, in the first few pages how much Valverde's minor wins and podiums should count? I remember something around 2018 that he'd swap most, if not all of his WC podiums for one win. Would Poulidor swap his podiums for Thomas' Tour win? Would Thomas do the same? Answers are clear. When you compare greatness (biggest) wins are what really matters. While smaller wins and podiums should count as well, they should be used to mostly split two close contenders.
Regarding "disrespecting" sprinters and throwing them out of top 100 because "they do nothing for 99% of the stage..", maybe we could apply the same logic for Rog, Valverder, Purito and take half of their wins because they don't do much for most of the stage and just outperform/outsprint their opponents it the last few hundred meters/kilometer? Granted, usually on a climb, but still...
And last about Cipo/Cav truckloads of stage wins and how they compare in the grand scale to riders like Fignon and LeMond.. I'm too young to have watched both of them and I didn't really dig how races really unfolded back in the days, but taking as example Pog this year, he could have won 5 or 6 stages had he, his team or the other teams cared enough to chase breaks the way sprinter teams do.. Rog could have 8 stage wins in this Vuelta...for the same reason.
For that reason alone I don't see reason to put much emphasis on sprint stage wins and how they compare to GT win. GT win requires you to sacrifice stages, heck even Thomas would've won the TT in his Tour and probably one or 2 stages..
Not sure how well I explained my point though.
It's very simple, when Rog, Valverde or Rodriguez win/won in a sprint, it was usually from a small group or bunch when the toughness of the race has eliminated the majority of weaker riders leaving the strongest to contest the win. Of course in such a situation, the sprinters will play their card, but they have to be good enough as a cyclist to survive the hard racing that splits the field.
That is a world away from having almost 200 riders finish in the same time as the winner in a race in which the sprinter can hide the entire way until the final 200m, then have trains lead them out. Comparing apples with oranges.
Look at the stats, over the last 30 years, apart from Indurain and Armstrong(not included on this list) all the other Top 10 stage winners in Le Tour are sprinters. Why? Even Indurain won 10 of his 12 stages in TTs. Look at another stat, over the last 30 years, riders have won 3 or more stages in a single Tour 34 times. Just 11 of those were non-sprinters. Armstrong 4 times, Pog x2, Froome, Nibali, Indurain. All were overall winners. The other 2 were Erik Dekker in 01 I think, and Wout Van Aert this year. That is why what Van Aert did was amazing, Winning a TT, mountain stage and a sprint in Paris. I had never seen that done before.
Extend that out to Giro/Vuelta and you will see a similar pattern. Look at the list of riders who have won stages in all 3 GTs, again dominated by sprinters. By awarding equal points for GT stage wins, sprinters are overly rewarded because they simply get more opportunities to win thus overinflating their standing. Quantity over quality.