I tend to agree. I like Bakula as a person. He has a great attitude. He's appreciative of Star Trek and his part in it, he doesn't have a big head or a bad attitude. And he's just a likable guy. He's got such a great attitude that I wouldn't have even minded a brief cameo in one of the Abrams movies as a proper send off for Bakula since TATV was, well TATV.
But yeah, in the first two seasons his acting was quite a bit stiff a lot of times. It seemed he wasn't totally comfortable and was trying to force things. He got much better during the Xindi arc and he did start to grow on me. Season 4 was much improved. He seemed more relaxed in the role and his easy going personality started showing more. Maybe part of it was the expectation by then that Enterprise was likely to end that season. Maybe he just figured, screw it, he's going to just enjoy his time on the show.
I like the idea of a proper send off. Though I wish they had had him pass the baton for Discovery. He's already in the CBS family, why not have an old video clip or hologram of Archer in Discovery's pilot episode for example?