Last night of a local 8 ball money league. My team shows ready to play. The other team does not. Using a 10 point for winning a match format. We are then told that according to the rules a forfeit gets 7 pts. Now I admit I was not aware of the rules, but I ( as captain of the team) was, shall I say not overjoyed to hear we were getting 112 pts.( 4 person team) out of 160 for not having an opponent. So needless to say a change will be made and I would like to know how other league rules handle forfeits.
I'm new to all of this, but very curious, and want to learn more; so please excuse my ignorance.
Looking at this I first thought "what are the rules" when you said "according to the rules." It would have been good to know them at the outset. (Also, when you say "match," you mean "game," correct?
After researching this a bit I have the strong impression that this is a pretty standard way of dealing with forfeits in 8 ball leagues. It's not strictly a win/lose thing like 9 ball, it's a point system.
League rules strive for fairness. If the opposing team can't play and forfeits, the league doesn't want to penalize your team, but then again, doesn't want to penalize the teams that actually played by awarding you the maximum number of points, as if you had played and won every game. Your average indicates the number of games you would likely have one, to a first order approximation, and here it seems you average 70% of your games played. So, you are awarded 7 points per game forfeited, which is 112. This doesn't harm your team to any large degree, and it doesn't harm the other teams that played, regarding relative standing. One can assume that a standard of fairness in forfeits must address all parties - including other teams in the league.
(One can imagine a slightly more complex method where you would be awarded a number of points based on your average and the forfeiting team's average, a closer approximation of what the likely outcome would be. But there's a chance this could be less than 112 points, depending on how good the forfeiting team is when they play.)
You then say "so needless to say a change will be made." How is that? Do you think you have the influence and the right to change the point allotment for forfeits, mid-season? Do you think the other teams and league officials will do this for you? Do you propose going back to the beginning of the season and re-calculating all the forfeits and adjusting the points totals? I don't think that will happen.
From my brief search of the web I've found many, i not most 8 ball leagues do this exactly as yours does.
You can't blame anyone if you started the season not knowing the rules, especially as the team captain!