NEW ORLEANS -- Reggie Bush is back in the Big Easy, where he's backing away from recent Twitter posts that indicated he may not see the New Orleans Saints in his future.

"I would love to retire here if possible," Bush said Saturday. "I would love to play for the Saints for however long my career, God willing, allows me to play. First and foremost, I want to be a Saint."

Bush spoke during his annual youth football camp at Tulane, on the same fields where he's been absent while teammates have been taking part in workouts organized by Saints quarterback Drew Brees during the NFL lockout.

Bush said he soon expects to join some of those workouts, albeit "sparingly." He also expressed regret over several of his recent comments on Twitter that he posted after the Saints selected Alabama running back and former Heisman Trophy winner Mark Ingram in the first round of the NFL draft in April.

Soon after Ingram was drafted, Bush wrote: "It's been fun New Orleans." He has since tweeted that he was making the best of the lockout by relaxing and taking vacation. The timing of the latter tweet, after about 40 Saints players had started working out together at Tulane, drew criticism from a number of fans in New Orleans.

"Obviously sometimes you write things and you say things and it may come off the wrong way," Bush said. "It may be taken the wrong way. You may not even mean it that way or you may regret it. At the end of the day, I probably shouldn't have tweeted that and I probably shouldn't have said that and I'm sure a lot of people took it the wrong way and I apologize to the city of New Orleans if they have."

Bush added that he believes Ingram is "a great player and I think he's going to have a huge role here."

"He can help us, you know? We need all the help we can get and that's part of what happens in the NFL draft," Bush continued. "You get help and you get great players."

Bush said he is healthy and that he has been working out hard on his own in Los Angeles at a gym owned by former Saints teammate Billy Miller.

"Look at these guns," he said, chuckling, as he flexed his right bicep.

He added that he has been "messing around" with some ultimate fighting training with FOX Sports personality Jay Glazer.