Mets center fielder Carlos Beltran could return to the field early as he makes good progress in his rehabilitation from knee surgery. "Every day I'm improving," Beltran said. "I don't feel the same way I did last year. At the same time, it's hard for me to say when I'm going to be ready. Doing this is no problem, but the big test will be when I start doing baseball activities every day, when I start running, catching fly balls and standing out there on my feet for a full day. I'm looking forward to that." He will start testing his knee by running "sometime in April," Beltran said. Full baseball activities should start in mid-April, meaning he likely won't return to the Mets until early May at the earliest. "Running, I am looking forward to that," Beltran said. "That will really let me know where I am. Once I test it, hopefully to God everything goes well and I can say I need this (amount of) time to get ready for baseball games and go from that. "When I start to do baseball activity, I'm not going to be far behind. I want to be right there."