Mathis' Breakout Performance Leads Surprise To AFL Semifinal Win

The Arizona Fall league's regular season was definitely not the best of times for New York Mets' corner-infield prospect Cole Mathis.

The first baseman/third baseman and 2024 second-round draft pick of the Chicago Cubs, who was acquired in late June from Chicago for pitcher David Peterson, had acquitted himself relatively well in 2026, despite the upheaval of the trade. Playing for five teams total, including the Mets' Single-A St. Lucie and High-A Brooklyn squads after arriving, Mathis hit a combined .238 with an .857 OPS, 13 doubles, 10 home runs and 42 RBIs in 52 total games, which helped him earn the No. 13 spot in MLB Pipeline's ranking of the Top 30 New York prospects.

The AFL season had been a different story, however, as he had put together a .160 average and .622 OPS in 13 games for the Surprise Saguaros.

Well, it appears that Mathis was just saving his best for first.

As in the first game of the AFL playoffs where he went 2-for-3 with two walks, a run scored and seven RBIs to lead the top-seeded Saguaros to a 10-4 shellacking of the Glendale Desert Dogs in the first of Friday's two AFL playoff semifinal contests.

With the win, the Saguaros will meet the Peoria Javelinas, 6-4 winners over the Salt River Rafters in the second semifinal, in Saturday's championship game, which is scheduled for 8 p.m. ET and will be broadcast live on the MLB Network.

Mathis' run-scoring damage came in a wide variety of ways. He started slowly as his groundout plated Zion Rose, giving Surprise a 1-0 lead after the first inning. In the second inning, he walked with the bases loaded to make it 3-0 after two. In the bottom of the third, his single knocked in Julian Brock and Dante Nori for a 7-0 advantage.

Then, in the bottom of the fifth, he applied the coup de grace, a three-run homer that made it 10-0 and allowed the Saguaros to cruise home to the victory.

The winning pitcher was Mathis' fellow Mets' farmhand Peyton Prescott, who pitched a scoreless first inning as the Saguaros' "opener," allowing one hit and one walk and striking out two.

The final Met to appear in the game was pitcher Brandon Girton who was touched for two runs on two hits with walks and a strikeout while recording the first out of the ninth inning.

Surprise's championship meeting was almost pre-ordained as the two teams had identical 17-10 records going into their meeting in the final game of the regular season, which the Saguaros won to secure the top seed in the playoffs. Now they will meet again with all of the postseason marbles on the line.