Passive Vs. Aggression

(Read my first blog, And the story begins, if you havent before you read this one. Thanks!)
As I play these Railbirds real money games, I see two trends that seem to occur: being overly passive or being overly aggressive. There's a lot more too (Hey, why not talk about those too!). People have no idea about pot control and just bet, bet, bet or do stupid stuff like raising 4x the big blind and folding to a shove. Plain and simple the play is terrible in these tournaments and you have like 5 people who have any chances of constantly winning these tournaments.

Overly passive players are those who you can just run over all day. These players most likely blind down to 2 or 3 big blinds and have to depend on luck to have any chance of making any money. A perfect example of this is in the Full Tilt Sunday $1 million Guarentee. Now the fact that this player (a railbird regualr) was deep in a sunday major is shocking. Top 10 with 50 and goes on to spew off a third of their stack. Ok, no problem they still have an average stack and have a good chance of actually winning the tournament right? Nope. This players goes on to blind off about 150k in chips and eventually got down to 1.5 big blinds in probably the biggest tournament they will ever play. They gave themselves absolutely no chance at the over 180k first prize and basically settled for a 2k pay day. When your in for $14 and you're up 2k already, you have to go for the one spot. But that is the true railbirds style of poker. Fold, fold, fold. Get lucky with 2 big blinds (double up), get lucky again (double up) and get chips. It has to bet be the most -ev stragety I have ever seen. I almost shot myself watching the continued massacre in the FT Million. This is a basic summery of what the basically passive railbirds stragety is:

Fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold.
Thinks to self: 7 big blinds maybe I should make a move
Railbird Observer Chat: You have plenty of time, be patient.
Fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold.
Thinks to self: 2 big blinds maybe I should make a move.
Railbirds Observer Chat: Be Patient, only aces or kings!
Thinks to self: AQ any good? Hmm, Maybe I'll push with it. The big blind obviously calls any two cards and sucks out on the helpless AQ!
Railbird Observer Chat: Thats just brutal, unlucky bud! Such a donk call by the big blind. You played (we use play lightly here as we've been folding the last hour) a great game!

OMG! Are you serious? You blind down to 1.5 big blinds and then complain about getting sucked out on? That's just the mind set of a railbird. No concept of fold equity or chip stack in relation to the blinds.

So basically on the other end of the spectrum you have the overly agreessive no sense of pot control spewtards. I don't think I've seen more pot bets and 4x the big blind raising ever. And then the overly aggressive railbirds switch it up and throw in a min raise followed by a pot bet no matter what comes on the flop. You don't think we don't know you obviously have air? It's just funny watching the spewtards play big pot after big pot with the most marginal hand. I don't think check is even in their bag of tricks. It's like I can't even make fun of the spewtards because they at least give themselves a chance to win the tournament opposed to the compulsive folders mention before. But the most funny thing I see out of the spewtards is the raising 4x the big blind and folding to a re-raise when they are getting better than 2 to 1. You're just like can you really raise a bad enough hand where you fold to a re-raise getting such good odds? I thought you were a spewtard and then you fold in that spot. It's just lol'able every time you see.

So there's basically the railbirds for you. Fold, fold, fold, fold, fold or raise 4x the big blind get re-shoved on then fold getting better than 2 to 1 odds. It's so great to play against these people. Too bad I run terrible (sometimes). I played the $5 Railbirds $400 Guarentee on Full Tilt. Obviously I make it about 10 before the money. I have two limps at 200/400 and I have 4770 in chips so it's an obvious shove when I have JJ. First guy folds and the second person insta-calls with 88. 8 ball in the door on the flop. GG me! That's the only way I ever get knocked out of these tournaments. Oh well, its all good and I will crush these once more.