WSOP Story: Dario Sammartino, $6 Million and the Ace-High Flush

Dario Sammartino’s 2019 World Series of Poker Main Event run ended one place short of the title—and with a $6 million payday. It also left poker fans with a useful reminder: knowing hand rankings, kickers and draw odds can matter just as much as knowing when a tournament is on the line.

The “ace-high flush” in this article is a teaching example, not a claim about the hand that ended Sammartino’s tournament. The final hand was a showdown involving a pair of kings against a pair of fours, not an ace-high flush. That distinction matters: poker stories are memorable, but the cards and the ranking rules should stay accurate.

Dario Sammartino at the 2019 WSOP Main Event

Sammartino, an accomplished Italian professional, reached the final heads-up match of the 2019 WSOP Main Event against Germany’s Hossein Ensan. The event drew 8,569 entries, and the winner’s prize was $10 million. Sammartino finished second and earned $6 million—an enormous result, even though the runner-up spot naturally stung after coming so close to the bracelet.

That’s the context behind the search for “dario sammartino 2019” and “WSOP Main Event payout”: this was not a small cash or a routine deep run. It was a final-table performance in poker’s most famous tournament, with millions of dollars and the world championship at stake.

The last hand is often summarized as kings versus fours. Ensan held pocket kings; Sammartino held 8♦4♦. The board ran 10♣ 9♠ 4♣ 2♥ 7♠, giving Sammartino a pair of fours and Ensan a winning pair of kings. The board did not make a flush, and neither player’s hand was an ace-high flush.

It’s worth keeping that detail straight because an ace-high flush is a separate, powerful hand category. It ranks below a full house and above a straight. And when players compare flushes, the highest card in the flush determines which one wins—not the suit symbol.

Where an ace-high flush sits in Texas Hold’em

In Texas Hold’em, each player makes the best five-card hand available from their two hole cards and the five community cards. You can use both hole cards, one, or neither. Suits have no ranking advantage: a spade is not stronger than a heart, and a diamond does not beat a club.

Here’s the standard ranking, from strongest to weakest:

Rank Hand Example 1Royal flushA-K-Q-J-10, all one suit 2Straight flushFive consecutive cards, all one suit 3Four of a kindFour cards of the same rank 4Full houseThree of a kind plus a pair 5FlushFive cards of one suit, not in sequence 6StraightFive consecutive cards, mixed suits allowed 7Three of a kindThree cards of the same rank 8Two pairTwo different pairs 9One pairTwo cards of the same rank 10High cardNo pair or higher combination

An ace-high flush contains an ace as the highest card in a five-card flush. For example, A♠ J♠ 8♠ 5♠ 2♠ is an ace-high flush. If another player has a king-high flush, the ace-high flush wins. If both players have an ace-high flush, compare the next-highest card, then the next one, until the hands differ. If all five cards match in rank, the pot is split.

Kicker check: kickers matter when the made hand doesn’t settle the comparison. With one pair, compare the pair first, then the remaining cards in order. With flushes, those remaining cards are part of the five-card flush itself. A side card outside the best five-card hand cannot rescue a weaker flush.

Printable cheat sheets and charts: useful, if you use them correctly

Beginners often misread a board because they focus on their hole cards instead of the best five-card hand. A printable hand-ranking cheat sheet can help you check whether you have a pair, straight, flush or something stronger. Keep one beside you during a home game or use a clean chart as a study aid before playing online.

Good printable cheat sheets and charts should make the rules easier to check—not promise a winning strategy. Look for clear examples of:

• Hand rankings from royal flush down to high card.
• How to use five community cards with two hole cards.
• How kickers break ties for pairs and other hands.
• The difference between a made flush and a flush draw.
• Common preflop starting-hand groups, clearly labeled as guidance rather than guarantees.

Equity charts are useful for a different reason. They estimate how often a hand wins or ties against another hand or range, given the cards known so far. They can show, for example, that a pair is ahead on the flop but vulnerable to several possible turn and river cards. Equity is not certainty: a hand with 70% equity still loses about three times in ten in comparable situations.

Hand odds and probabilities

Odds depend on what you’re counting. The probability of being dealt a particular made hand from a random five-card hand is not the same as the chance of completing a draw by the river in Texas Hold’em. Always check whether a figure refers to five-card poker, a starting hand, or a post-flop situation.

As a five-card hand example, four of a kind odds are xn--pokerhnds-bcb.com 0.0240% (1 in 4,164)—also commonly stated as about 1 in 4,165. The tiny difference between those “one in” figures comes from rounding. Either way, four of a kind is rare in a random five-card deal.

Those numbers do not mean you have a 0.0240% chance to make quads from any point in a Hold’em hand. Your odds depend on your hole cards, the board, and how many cards remain to come. A player holding a pocket pair, for instance, has a different path to four of a kind than someone who starts with unpaired cards.

Draw odds by flop, turn and river

A draw is a hand that needs one or more future cards to improve. The familiar example is a flush draw: if you have four cards of the same suit among your two hole cards and the flop, you need one more card of that suit to make a flush. With a full deck and no unseen cards exposed, there are typically nine cards of that suit left—called nine outs.

Here are the approximate chances of hitting at least one of those nine outs:

Situation Cards to come Chance to hit a flush After the flopTurn only9 / 47 = 19.1% After the turnRiver only9 / 46 = 19.6% After the flopTurn and riverAbout 35.0%

The flop-to-river figure is not 19.1% plus 19.6% exactly, because the second card is dealt only if the first card hasn’t already completed the draw. The calculation is 1 minus the chance of missing twice: 1 − (38/47 × 37/46), which is about 35.0%.

A common home-game mistake is confusing a straight draw with a flush draw. Four cards of one suit make a flush draw; four consecutive ranks can make a straight draw. They are different hands with different outs. An open-ended straight draw usually has eight cards that complete it—for example, 6-7-8-9 can hit a 5 or 10. With eight outs, the chance to hit on the next card is 8/47, or about 17.0%; from flop through river it’s about 31.5%, assuming all outs are clean.

“Clean” is the important qualifier. An out that completes your straight may also give an opponent a flush, a full house, or a higher straight. If villain has a higher flush draw and you have a lower one, some cards that look helpful can leave you losing. If villain has A♠ K♠ and you have Q♠ J♠ on a board with two spades, your flush draw is not simply nine safe outs: the ace-high flush draw has you dominated when a spade arrives.

Use the numbers without forgetting the situation

Draw odds help you estimate whether continuing is reasonable, but they don’t make the decision on their own. Compare the chance to improve with the price of the call, and consider whether your outs are reliable. If a call costs 100 chips to win a pot of 400 chips, you’re being offered 4-to-1 pot odds, which requires winning 20% of the time to break even in a simplified calculation. A nine-out flush draw from flop to turn hits about 19.1%, just short of that threshold before considering future betting, implied value or other ways to win.

At a low-stakes table, also pay attention to what the other player’s actions represent. Someone who bets large into a coordinated board may already have a made hand. A draw can be worth continuing with, but it is not a made flush—and a flush draw is not a straight draw just because both hands need help.

What Sammartino’s run teaches new players

Sammartino’s 2019 Main Event finish is a story about reaching the highest-pressure stage of the game, but the useful lesson for everyday players is more basic: identify the best five-card hand, compare the right cards, and keep the payout separate from the hand-ranking rules. A $6 million runner-up finish doesn’t make the losing hand a winning one; at showdown, the cards decide.

For practice, review the hand rankings on printable cheat sheets, then use equity charts and draw-odds tables to check your assumptions. Count actual outs, calculate the chance by the turn or river, and ask the kicker question whenever the hand is one pair or a tie is possible. And if you see an ace-high flush, remember: it beats lower flushes, loses to a full house or better, and has no special suit advantage.