"there's ten different ways to do everything"

I believe this observation is a bit misleading. Indeed, Scala does offer some alternatives, but these are helpful in the transition from other languages with less powerful type systems. Idiomatic Scala is not really a hodge-podge of choices.

Trying to have a small language sometimes results in allowing (or having to allow it in the sense of not outlawing it) multiple ways to do the same thing, especially as the expressiveness increases.

As an example, I don't think Python's “there's only one way to do it”-approach would have a chance of surviving if the language was as expressive as Scala.

In the end, as long as Scala stays simpler than Java 8 and vastly simpler than F#, C# and C++, it's good enough for me.