Picard the action hero only made sense to me in First Contact. Frankly, I found it made no sense for him to be the one to stay on the Ba'ku planet and defend them while Riker goes to convince the Federation Council. Picard is the seasoned diplomat, if someone's going to convince the Council to reverse the decision, it should have been him while Riker stayed behind and defended the Ba'ku.
Of course, I still say that we should have had the Battle for Betazed as the ninth movie instead of Insurrection...