The Curious Case of Martin Frk: One of the best players not in NHL
Only seven teams have scored fewer goals than the Los Angeles Kings this season. They’re hurting for offense. But they refuse to call up the player with the hardest shot ever recorded in North American professional hockey history at 109.2 mph.
His name is Martin Frk, and he just happens to be the reigning AHL player of the month skating for the Ontario Reign. Frk racked up 14 points in eight games in November and currently sits third in AHL scoring, having tallied 22 points in 17 games.
Frk is 28, has NHL experience, and is playing on a one-way NHL contract at the league minimum. In need of a body over the weekend, the Kings recalled T.J. Tynan instead.
In the curious case of Martin Frk, you’re left to ask: What the Frk?
He is one of the best players not currently in the NHL. Frk might shoot the puck harder than anyone on planet Earth. He’s a proven scorer in the minors. And he’s done it at the NHL level when paired with a skilled centerman.
But there are a few things working against him.
At 28 years old, Frk is no longer a prospect. He’s also outside of the organization that drafted him (Detroit) and no one in the front office has a vested interested in his success. And now he has been labeled as a minor league player.
Once you have a label, it’s hard to shake it.
I know because I lived it.
I was seen as a quality AHL goalie. But no matter how well I played in that league, teams weren’t exactly lining up to give me a real shot in the NHL beyond the occasional call-up due to injury.
I’m proud of my career. But it was frustrating to perpetually be stuck in the minors.
And that’s the predicament currently facing Frk. In my eyes, this is a player that belongs in the NHL. He has a skill that teams yearn for. He can put the puck in the net. And he’s not expensive.
It’s not like he doesn’t have credentials. In 118 NHL games played between the Carolina Hurricanes, Detroit Red Wings, and Los Angeles Kings, Frk has 39 points. He’s in his ninth year of professional hockey after spending his junior career with the Halifax Mooseheads – where he won the Memorial Cup in 2013.
You might recognize some names from that team. Nathan MacKinnon. Jonathan Drouin. MacKenzie Weegar. Zach Fucale. Frk finished second in scoring for the Mooseheads during both the regular season and playoffs during that championship season.
A second-round pick of the Red Wings (No. 49 overall) in 2012, Frk bounced between the AHL and ECHL in his first two professional seasons. But the following year – in 2015-16 – Frk found his stride. He played the entire season in the AHL, scoring 27 times in 67 games.
The 2016-17 season saw more of the same from the native of Pelhrimov, Czech Republic. He made his NHL debut with the Carolina Hurricanes after being claimed off waivers at the start of the season.
Once he returned to the AHL, Frk once again found the back of the net 27 times for the Grand Rapids Griffins. He added five more goals during the Calder Cup playoffs en route to an AHL championship.
The clip above was Frk’s biggest: the game-winning goal against the Syracuse Crunch in the final game of the season.
Did you happen to catch who was in net for the Tampa Bay Lightning’s AHL affiliate?
Yeah. Me.
It’s hard for me to watch the clip. It’s a simple screen and I should have been able to find the shot. But even if I did, it was a laser. Frk hammered the puck off the top corner of the cage from a stand-still. He released it so quickly that I wasn’t able to find a visual window and it was in the net before I could even move.
Over four years later, it still stings. But I remember thinking afterwards: this Frk guy is special. He has an absolute missile.
He was teeing off all series long. One-timers high and hard. Snapshots down the wing. He let it go from everywhere. And it was so heavy. It felt like the puck was trying to drive through my body. One of his shots hit my thigh and left a golf ball-size knot under the skin for the better part of three weeks.
As a goalie, you don’t forget that.
It’s common for people to ask me who has the hardest shot I’ve ever faced. It’s a fun question. I’ve played against Shea Weber. Zdeno Chara. Alexander Ovechkin. All the usual suspects. But my answer after 2017 was Martin Frk. Undoubtedly, unquestionably, unequivocally: Martin Frk.
No one would know better than his Grand Rapid Griffins teammate Matt Ford. The former captain – who announced his retirement from professional hockey this fall after a 12-year career – saw first hand what Frk was and is capable of.
“Our goalies wouldn’t stand in front of his shots in practice,” Ford told Daily Faceoff. “He used like a 70 flex stick. That thing would bend like a bow when he leaned into it. If he ever hit anyone with that rocket of his – goalie, teammate, [opposing] team – he would genuinely come over and apologize. He felt so bad.”
It wasn’t just Frk’s shot that caught Ford’s attention.
“Most my career I was one of the first guys to the rink. For a 10 a.m. practice, he would often be done with his first workout by the time I got there at 7:45 am,” Ford explained. “Great guy. Hard worker. The guy is a machine in the weight room and he can get around the ice well enough to play on any line.”
I was zero percent surprised when Frk played the entire 2017-18 season for the Red Wings. He scored 11 times in 68 games, five of which were on the power play. What was more impressive was that he scored 25 points that year playing just a little over 10 minutes a night.
Scoring 20 or more the following season seemed realistic.
And then Frk scored once in 30 games during the 2018-19 season and finished the year in the AHL. For whatever reason, it didn’t work in the Motor City.
So on July 1, 2019, Frk signed as a free agent with the Kings organization.
He spent most of that shortened season in the AHL with Ontario, scoring 23 goals in 37 games and was an All-Star – where he set the AHL hardest shot record.
Do you recognize the voice doing color commentary?
Yeah. Me.
Frk was the last player to shoot and I knew he was the man to beat. Sure enough, his second shot was an absolute rocket at 109.2 mph. Every player on the ice swarmed the Reign forward to congratulate him on the new record. Nothing brings people to their feet like the hardest shot competition. And Frk was the new king.
His standout play for Ontario in the early part of the season led to a 17-game call-up with the Kings. Frk scored six times and totaled eight points. But last year he only suited up for one game with Los Angeles.
Now he’s stuck in the minors, racking up points for the AHL Ontario. But plenty of Frk’s former teammates believe he can still blossom into an NHL scorer. Just ask Ford.
“I think he’s made himself a more complete player over the years, bouncing up and down between the AHL and NHL,” Ford said. “He provides a shooting threat that literally no one else in the world can offer.”