LAKELAND, Fla. >> There are different kinds of rehabs. There’s injury rehab, which is what Casey Mize endured the two previous winters coming back from Tommy John and back surgeries. This offseason, Mize put himself through a different type of rehab program.

Call it a career rehab.

With his body as strong and healthy as it’s ever been, Mize went to work on revitalizing his craft. He spent the winter in pitching labs — the Driveline facilities in Arizona and Tampa and Maven Baseball Academy in Atlanta. When he wasn’t there, he was continuing his work with his trainer in St. Petersburg.

“I just went and found some different opinions and I got some different eyes on me,” he said. “Which was really good.”

Mize will be 28 on May 1 and, despite his immense talent and some early flashes, he’s still trying to establish himself. The injuries detoured him, for sure. But he came back last season and even with the best fastball and splitter of his career, consistency was elusive.

He made 20 starts, posting a 4.49 ERA, and opponents hit .290 with a .773 OPS. Right-handed batters hit 30 points higher off him than lefties. He posted low strikeout (17%) and chase (22%) rates with a harsh 45-percent hard-hit rate. He finished the season in the bullpen and was not included on the Tigers’ postseason roster.

Thus, the pitching lab tour this winter and his quest to find the best version of himself.

“I just got some clarity on some pitch usage,” he said. “I have enough major league sample size now where we can look at what works for me in the big leagues and what doesn’t. We kind of dove into all that. Like, you’re using X pitch too much late in counts or X pitch too much early in counts.

“I got a lot of clarity on how I need to approach hitters, just in general. Ultimately, the hitters will tell me what works and what doesn’t. But at least I will have a really good plan going into it.”

At Driveline, he dove into his mechanics, not so much to build velocity but to facilitate consistency.

“That misconception is one I had, as well, that they are solely velocity-driven,” Mize said. “When I went there, we didn’t really talk about velocity whatsoever. That was not the goal of me going there. They had some stuff for me to work on in terms of how I’m moving. A by-product of that might be increased velocity, but that was never the intent or their main feedback for me.

“We were mostly talking about the slider and carrying the fastball a little better.”

Mize has altered his slider, which had a minus-4 run value last year with opponents slugging .500 off it. He’s developed a couple of variations, one tighter and one with more horizontal break.

“I just need to execute better; that’s the main thing,” he said. “Change around the usage a little bit and be a little more efficient in that usage. Like, don’t keep forcing the two-strike sliders or whatever. I need to be able to move on to other things.”

Mize knows he’s in a fight for one of two spots in the Tigers’ rotation. He was in the same spot last spring. It was a three-man battle for two spots last year. It’s seven for two this year with Mize, top prospect Jackson Jobe, Keider Montero, Kenta Maeda, Matt Manning, Ty Madden and Brant Hurter.

“I would compete the same if we signed five guys or traded five guys away,” Mize said. “It doesn’t really matter. I am happy we made our team better, I really am. It’s going to be more competitive for most of the guys here, which is great. I love to compete. I love to play, man.

“The things that we do from a personnel standpoint aren’t going to change the way I go about competing and the things I do.”