I guess it says he has the form to attack instead of recovering from crashes or disappearing from the race early. Even though he knows he will never beat Pogacar or Roglic in a finish at least he tried a few times.
This wasn't actually intended as a slight on Richie. I've made enough of those over time. However, probably because of his ever-increasing résumé of failures in GTs, whether his fault or not, Richie has become an incredibly timid GT rider. Much as Alejandro Valverde lights up smaller races left right and centre, then retreats into his shell and waits for the race to develop in GTs and major classics, Porte as leader is generally pretty conservative in three-week races, at odds with his more ambitious and risk-taking approach in one-week races.
When a guy who has made one real move which lasted a couple of kilometres (on Peyresourde) and a 500m counter-move attempt (on Grand Colombier) is the second most aggressive rider in the GC battle, you have problems. Because Richie hasn't done much different to previous races where he's been characterised as a conservative racer as he's passed up chances to gain time because of that fear of blowing up, which in his case is likely because he has done so spectacularly a couple of times in the past. And yet in
this race, it's enough to make him stand out for his ambition compared to the other guys in the GC mix.