I'll try to answer that.  I wrestled most of my life, from elementary school on up through college.  My passion for wrestling pretty much consumed every spare moment of my time.  It was a year long endeavor that I gladly poured my heart and soul into.  At the time I thought my rewards were ribbons and medals that I won in competition; but now looking back, my rewards were just being able to compete and enjoy the camaraderie of my team-mates and fellow wrestlers.  Sadly, mounting injuries sustained over the years were too much for me to overcome and I had to retire from the sport I love.  

I worked my ass off EVERY day.  My ability to wrestle offered me a chance to receive a top notch education at the college I loved from little on up.  In a nutshell, wrestling was my job and it provided me a means to achieve the career I now enjoy.  So I can we could split hairs and and debate whether we athletes quit our sports or retire from our sports but in the end does it really matter??

When Journey announced that he is retiring from football, I knew exactly what he meant and understand the exact same emotions that he's going thru.  The guy just had his passion jerked away from him and now he's suddenly facing the rest of his life without football.  Without the smell of fresh cut grass, without the sound of cheering fans, without the sounds of pads cracking etc.  

So yeah, I'm ok with him using the term retire.  Does one have to receive a monetary compensation in order to retire??

Thanks for your response, I can read into your post your true passion about wrestling and the sacrifices you made during your career and I totally understand and respect those sacrifices. 

To answer your question about the monetary aspect of retirement; no, one does not have to have monetary compensation to retire per se, however in my generation retiring pretty much meant as I stated above; never heard the reference of retiring by a HS or college player who was ending his career in my day but more so over the last year or so. Just a changing of the times, makes me want to think those guys are now getting a monthly bone so to speak, lol. 

My take on it is he  did not quit, to me quitting is a personal choice, he left because he is physically unable to do it.  That is the difference in my opinion 

Posted by: @psu61

Can someone who is more contemporary than me explain exactly what it means when a high school or college football player declares he is Retiring from football; I'm sorry I just don't get it, in my world retiring means I've worked my ass off long enough and met all eligible and/or financial requirements to say audios and then receive my monthly allotment etc.. 

For me, when a player leaves the game at that level, it simply is; I quit, I am no longer playing the game etc, but to say I'm Retiring, ..... 

I imagine that this is a reference to Journey Brown saying he was retiring from football... because I guess why else would you be bringing it up?

My only comment would be that if Journey Brown saying he's retiring means "he quit" to you, I really don't know what else to say but he had a medical issue, that's not quitting. I get that maybe saying you are retiring is a bit much in High School, but college these days playing football is worth $100,000+ in free education, training, etc. To me it's really a full time job so I have no issue with it.

I kind of agree with 61, when you retire you are of the age to sit on your butt unless you want to work. college or high school kids need to say, chit I got to find something else to do because eyes got medical problems and I can’t play football anymore. That’s how it would be said at Bankhead courts in Atlanta anyway. BTW my wife gets all over my butt about saying eyes but it just comes out that way when I talk. My father-in-law gets a kick out of it to lol

@southern-psu-fan: When you retire,every day is a Saturday!!!!

@southern-psu-fan

I've never thought of retiring as never working again, just leaving a certain profession behind to do something else.