TAMPA, Fla. -- Aaron Judge said on Thursday that he is “feeling great” as the slugger continues to work out behind the scenes at the Yankees’ Spring Training complex, waiting for clearance to test his swing in the batting cages.

Judge was diagnosed with a stress fracture of his first right rib on Friday, an injury that the club believes dates to an attempted catch on Sept. 18. Judge has been told to rest for two weeks before undergoing another CT scan to evaluate his healing.

“We're progressing really well,” Judge said. “I feel like I might be ahead of schedule. I don't know what the schedule is, but I'm kind of pushing their timeline as much as I can. We're going to start ramping up things here. I'm trying to get the CT scan done as soon as I can.”

Judge said that he has been able to perform some of his cardio and weight-lifting programs, though he has been shut down from hitting, throwing and overhead lifts. If Judge’s CT scan shows improvement, he could be cleared to resume on-field activities quickly.

Asked for his target date to return to the Yankees' lineup, Judge said that he’d prefer to return on Opening Day, but a more realistic estimate would be somewhere between the middle of April and early in May.

“I don't want to put myself in a box and say middle of April and then answer questions on April 15: ‘Hey, why weren't you in there?'" Judge said. “So we'll see. I'm trying to push the timeline and I want to come back healthy and strong. I don't want to come back and rush it. I'll be ready for games in October and the rest of the season, but I'm going to be smart about it and get back to my team when I can.”

Close call
Zack Britton said that he normally uses a protective L-Screen when pitching to teammates, but the left-hander decided to shun one when he took the mound for live batting practice at Steinbrenner Field on Wednesday morning.

As he walked off the field with what was later diagnosed to be a bruised right wrist, having been smacked by a line drive off of Erik Kratz’s bat, Britton said that he thought of it as “karma.”

“It's a weird situation,” Britton said. “You don't want to hit your guys, and the last thing Kratz wants to do is hit a ball back at me, but you can't control that when you're out there in the game. I mean, anything can happen.”

Britton said that he received treatment on the wrist on Thursday, and he believes that he will be ready to return to the mound soon.

“He squared it up really good,” Britton said. “It hit me on the side, so it missed the bone. I got pretty lucky because it could have been pretty bad.”