Dang, BulletCatcher beat me to it. Good call man. Anyways, that call deals more with delay of game rather than playing the puck. Trust me, I played the puck a lot, and I never got called for it (the refs and I didn't have too good of a relationship) so you'd figure they'd at least call me for that since they don't like me
. But seriously, the goalie being allowed to wander adds a dimension to the game that the opposition need to deal with, just like teams needed to deal with the trap back when the Canadiens started playing it back in the 70s. Staying on topic here, the goalie wandering adds excitement to the game as well, you don't know if he's gonna gaff it a la Patrick Roy or go Brodeur/Turco on the other team's ass and make 'em look like idiots. Also, if the goalie weren't allowed to wander, the flow of the game would actually be impeded, more icing calls, which leads to more faceoffs and stoppages of play, let 'em wander and deal with it. Calling them fair game is just too much and whole schemes would be based on intentionally hurting a really good goalie that likes to wander, i.e. Marty Brodeur, Marty Turco and others in order to get an advantage that would be unfair. That to me is against the spirit of what hockey is and I think it would get too out of hand if open season were called on goalies.