I don’t like everything he did either, but I did love the jazz fusion albums as well as his stuff with Rod Stewart.
Different strokes, as they say, and I also like the guitar players you mentioned.
I like guitar virtuosity but I like it within a tune that has vocals. Could be The Stones, Mick Taylor. Cream. Traffic and Steve Winwood. And so on. Led Zeppelin, Jimmy Page. Instrumentals are boring for me.