MIAMI -- Two months ago, Marlins designated hitter Garrett Cooper was named to his first All-Star team. In the tough times that followed, he tried reminding himself of that fact.

That recent rough stretch looks well in the rear-view after Cooper reached base four times in the Marlins' 6-3 victory over the Mets on Friday night at loanDepot park. Miami has won back-to-back games for the first time since Aug. 22-23. 

“I think I put a little bit too much pressure on myself being an All-Star for the first time, thinking I had to live up to that billing, seeing those kinds of guys in the All-Star Game,” Cooper said. “Felt like, ‘Wow, I need to be as good as those guys are.’ And it kind of just went sideways a little bit on me. You've just got to remind yourself to play baseball. You can't think about whatever happens. It's just something you say that you need to move on.”

Cooper’s two-run homer in the first inning off David Peterson gave rookie Edward Cabrera, who allowed three runs in 5 2/3 frames, an early lead. It also snapped Cooper's 31-game homerless drought -- the longest of his career for a single season.

The 31-year-old singled in the third and doubled in the fifth, scoring on Nick Fortes’ RBI double to make it a 4-1 ballgame. Cooper fell a triple shy of the first cycle in Marlins history when he walked on five pitches in the seventh.

From July 2 through Sunday, Cooper hit .092 (10-for-109) with six RBIs in 35 games. He struck out 43 times and walked on 13 occasions. During a modest four-game hit streak that dates to Tuesday in Philadelphia, Cooper has gone 8-for-15 (.533) with two walks, no strikeouts and three consecutive multihit games. Cooper said he felt something click when he lined out sharply to left fielder Kyle Schwarber on an Aaron Nola curveball in his first at-bat. 

“His at-bats after the break were choppy,” manager Don Mattingly said. “You see it in Pittsburgh, [he] comes back a couple of games … and he was on the IL. It's hard to get rhythm after that, and it just seemed like he didn't have any rhythm. He was scuffling for whatever reason, and you just know he's going to hit. He's always hit, so it's like one of those guys you think is going to hit.”

With Jazz Chisholm Jr. and Jorge Soler sidelined, and Avisaíl García out with a left hamstring strain until Tuesday, Miami’s offense scuffled without three key run-producers. Cooper’s struggles at the plate didn't help matters. During his rough patch, the Marlins scored 2.4 runs per game and went 20-38.

Until his RBI double on Thursday, Cooper had gone a career-high 19 games without driving in a run. In the 32 games in which he has driven in a run this season, the Marlins have gone 21-11.

“Just talking with the hitting coaches, you've seen what we've done in the last month,” Cooper said. “It's been a grind. It's been a struggle for us offensively. We were in the playoff hunt, and then we weren't. It kind of all spiraled real quickly. I think everybody took that to heart and maybe tried to do a little bit too much as a whole.

"When some key players go down, it feels like other players try to step up and try to be the guy, and it just gets really out of control, and it did. As you go throughout the year, you need little reminders to say, ‘Screw it,’ and just kind of go out there and play.”

Thanks to Charles Leblanc’s two-run homer in the eighth, Miami has scored six runs in consecutive games. This is the same Marlins club that scored two runs or fewer in nine consecutive games -- the longest streak by any team since the 2003 D-backs.

“The season's a long grind,” Cooper said. “It can spiral on you, and it spiraled on me for about six weeks. I felt like I had to do maybe too much for the team, maybe putting way too much pressure on my shoulders as a hitter. It spiraled out of control. Just trying to find my footing again and going out there and saying ‘screw it’ and attack early and attack often. Get my foot down early, and trying to adjust to how each team pitches me. Facing Peterson earlier this year and kind of [having] an idea of what he wanted to do. It's a mental grind. Like I said before, it's more mental than anything physical you can do out there on the field.”