Atletisk Nyhamn is a professional baseball club based in Nyhamn, Northern, Koana Islands. They were successfully voted into the Koanian baseball pyramid following the 1902 baseball season; the second time the team attempted to join the competition.
The club was founded in 1897 by a group of friends, led by Mathias Andersen, who regularly met up for weekly games of poker at a bar known as Fantastisk Tryffel (The Fantastic Truffle). The group of men thought playing baseball on weekends would be a great way to stay fit and healthy.
Initially the team was called the Atletisk Klubb (Athletic Club) and they played regular friendly games as part of a membership-only league known as Nyhamn Allians. Whilst records are sketchy of this league, newspaper articles suggest Tryffeln lost 4 times in 18 games in the 1898 season, beating Nyhamn Flottbas (Nyhamn Naval Base) 8-4 in the final game of the season to clinch the title.
The success of the 1898 season prompted the club to rebrand in an attempt to join the Super Ligan. Holding open try-outs as Atletisk Nyhamn in February of 1899 saw the team sign many players from rival teams and clinch the Nyhamn Allians title for the second time. The first bid to join the Super Ligan was rejected later on the same year, with the team securing just 3 votes.
The team maintained their affiliation with the Nyhamn Allians, winning the title in 1900, and 1902 – losing out to Nyhamn All-American in 1901 – before successfully applying to join Division Ett for the 1903 season with 14 votes; the highest number out of all the clubs on the ballot.
Atletisk Nyhamn plays it’s games out of Westerback Stadion, situated on the north bank of the Fole River, just west of downtown. The 35,000-seater stadium features a deep centre field known as Dubbelstad (Double Town) due to the high number of doubles it produces, helping to turn this ground into a slight hitters park. A shallow left field foul pole is offset with the 29-foot high wall that extends to just left of centre, giving just a slight increase in home runs by right-handed batters.
The team’s nickname is Pokerpojkar (Poker Boys) due to the founding members of the club, however, an old logo used from 1968 to 1979 used a king of diamonds card with the king holding a baseball bat, giving the team a second nickname Kungarna (The Kings).