Video: Campbell plans to sit down with Savard at some point

NHL Senior Executive VP of Hockey Operations Colin Campbell was interviewed on NHL Overtime on VS over the phone last night.

He was asked about numerous topics, including the recent unearthing of emails in which — among other things — he criticizes Bruins center Marc Savard as a diver.

While Campbell was unapologetic and even said that when he wrote those emails he didn’t realize they “could be retrieved” for use in a court case or anything else, he also responded the following way to a question from former Bruins defenseman Aaron Ward about apologizing to Savard:

“At some point and time I’ll sit down with Marc Savard,” he said.

After explaining that he once coached Savard with the New York Rangers and that when he was fired, Savard was sent to the minors, Campbell then said: “I don’t think it’s an apology. I think it’s an explanation we have to talk about.”

Here’s the full video, with the Savard talk starting about 1:40 in:

Credit goes to the VS crew for actually broaching the subject and not pulling any punches. And, of course, credit to Campbell to missing the point. He thinks it’s ludicrous that anyone is drawing the conclusion that because he called Savard a faker three years ago, he thought Savard was faking after the Matt Cooke hit last spring. Who are these people, Colin? No one in their right mind is saying that. What people are asking is if you have these strong opinions, positive and negative, how can you possibly rule in an unbiased fashion on punishment when these players are involved on either side of incident?

We might never get that answer. All we’ll get is seemingly a lifetime more of Campbell’s dartboard justice from behind the curtain of secrecy that the NHL operations department works behind.