Four-time Pro Bowl tailback Priest Holmes, who returned to the field with the Kansas City Chiefs last month following nearly two years of inactivity, has decided to leave the game and announced his retirement at a Wednesday afternoon news conference. Holmes, 34, spent the past few days counseling with family members and friends and speaking with medical experts about a re-occurrence of the neck problems that sidelined him for two years, two sources close to him told ESPN.com on Tuesday night. The decision to retire came after Holmes suffered three hits in last Sunday's game at Indianapolis that left him with some tingling in his extremities. Chiefs' team President Carl Peterson told Holmes to go home Tuesday and to take the night to sleep on his decision, ESPN.com's John Clayton reported. According to a source, it wasn't that Holmes re-injured his neck as much as he experienced a recurrence of the symptoms that led to his 18-month layoff. "After the third [hit]," a source close to Holmes told ESPN.com on Wednesday, "it was like Priest thought, 'Maybe this is God's way of telling me this is it.' [Coach) Herm Edwards asked him, when he came out after the third hit, if he could go back in, and it was like, 'Uh, let me think about this.' He kind of knew that was the message that this was it for him."