I have a few thoughts, too (surprise, surprise):
As you noted, your proposal does not address the issue that Ben presented to us, which I think is the most significant in this discussion (and certainly one of the reasons goalies aren't really valued higher than a 10th player on a roster).
A number of teams have carried two goalies (including ours, yes) and have tried to manage the slot like any other position. I imagine this has reduced, by at least some small amount, the likelihood that those teams have a game disadvantage for any given week. I doubt it's been by much, however. For instance, here's a easy to imagine a scenario as our league is currently configured: Team A has two goalies, one with 3 games, one with 4 for the coming matchup; Team B has only one goalie, who has 3 games; at the end of the week, Team A only got two goalie games, despite choosing the 4-game goalie, while Team B got 3.
Anyway, without getting into it much further at this point, the above scenario shows two main flaws in our current setup: (1) we have only one slot with which to accumulate points for the week for a particular position, and (2) goalies, unlike other players, often do not even play in games for their team (and owners rarely have the opportunity to know when those missed games will be).
By retaining the one-slot, lock-in roster position and current scoring system, even if we 'force' owners to hold at least two goalies, I doubt we'll significantly reduce the rather nasty games-in-hand advantage, nor will we address the high volatility of weekly scoring by goalies (something that Ben didn't talk about, but which I think exists, and which also hurts the balance of the league at bit -- stats people? more sweet graphs?)
A change that would remedy, at least in part, all three of those problems (game advantage, missed games, scoring volatility) is allowing teams to play two goalies per week -- hence my initial suggestion. To tweak the goalie scoring per game to keep balance in the league (in terms of player position output relative to contribution to winning) in this scenario would be trivial -- we could just adjust it to work for us. I'm not convinced that the concern about goalies' value overriding that of all other players in a two-slot scenario is warranted, either (especially if we balance the scoring relatively well). Sure, having two 2.0 goalies vs two 1.5 goalies would great, but so is having three 1.8 centres vs three 1.4 centres -- almost nobody in the league is "rich" enough to have 3 C's at 1.8+, but everyone is rich enough to have 1.4's. Any team that wanted to spend their pool of player value on good goalies would have to do so at the expense of other talent. (Another small reason: even with a powerful relative scoring position, goalies' year-to-year scoring variability will always suppress their market value to some degree -- are you going to get 2010 Ryan Miller or 2011 Ryan Miller?)
All that said, where this idea might fall down is with league expansion. As we move to 14 (or 16) teams, even with a two goalie per team maximum, I doubt the pool will be deep enough to accommodate two starting goalies. Here's the number of goalies starting 50 or more games from the last five seasons:
- 2010-11: 24
- 2009-10: 18
- 2008-09: 19
- 2007-08: 22
- 2006-07: 22
So, I'm not sure where that leaves us. I don't as of yet have an alternative to suggest. Looking at some past stats and other scoring models will probably help. So, I guess I'll do that...
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