By Perry Green, AFRO Sports Editor
Former Baseball star Sammy Sosa recently explained his reasoning for bleaching his skin during an E60 interview.
When asked how he felt about people criticizing him for lightening his skin, the 49-year-old Dominican native said he uses a special lotion on his skin not to look lighter, but to look clean and younger.
Former Baseball star Sammy Sosa shown before (left) the use of skin bleaching cream, and after (right) having used it for years. (AP Photo and Screengrab from news video)
“It’s just a little lotion I put on my face, but it’s not like that—oh my God,” Sosa said during the E60 interview. “I like to put it on because I like to have my skin clean.
“If the people are mad at me , I’m sorry. I don’t do it because of . I don’t have that intention. I do it because, hey, look, I want to be 50 but I look 17, and that’s why I do it. It’s as simple as that,” Sosa continued.
When the E60 interviewer challenged Sosa’s claim that he looks 17 years old, Sosa laughed and said, “OK, maybe I look 35, but that’s why I do it.”
But Sosa’s claim that he uses the lotion only to appear younger, not lighter, conflicts with what he told the media nearly a decade ago when people first began to notice his skin was getting lighter. Sosa had admitted in a 2009 interview with Univision’s Primer Impacto, that he was using a bleaching cream and was fully aware that it whitened his skin.
“It’s a bleaching cream that I apply before going to bed and whitens my skin some” Sosa said in an old Univision interview.
“It’s a cream that I have, that I use to soften , but has bleached me some. I’m not a racist; I live my life happily.”
