Lala Kent threw fans a curveball by revealing the origin of her newborn baby’s name. On the September 23, 2024 episode of her “Give Them Lala” podcast, the “Vanderpump Rules” star revealed she named her baby after a controversial MLB star.
“I have always loved the name Sosa,” Kent told her listeners. “I loved it ever since I saw the [2001] movie ‘Hardball’ with Keanu Reeves. All the kids go to the baseball game, and they see Sammy Sosa. And I just was ‘Oh my God, I am obsessed with that name.’”
Kent explained that she started putting together baby names at a very young age. “And that has been on my list,” she said of Sosa. “It has traveled with me from the time I was playing with Barbies to now. And the name has never left.”
Kent, 34, welcomed her second child, a baby girl she named Sosa, on September 3. The Bravo star, who shares a 3-year-old daughter, Ocean, with her ex, Randall Emmett, conceived baby No. 2 using a sperm donor and intrauterine insemination (IUI).
Fans Reacted to Lala Kent’s Baby Name Story
GettySammy Sosa.
Kent long teased that her child’s name would begin with an “S.” Many fans also thought she would keep with a “water” or “ocean” theme as she did with her first daughter.
According to Today.com, once the baby’s name was revealed, some fans told Kent that “Sosa” is a slang term for cocaine as well as the last name of the drug lord in the movie “Scarface.” Some begged her to change her baby’s name.
Days later, fans had a big reaction to Kent’s full explanation of her child’s name.
“I’m shocked she actually named her kid after Sammy Sosa,” one commenter wrote on Instagram.
“I’m shocked she admits it,” another agreed.
“I was surprised to hear that Lala chose this name after hearing it in Hardball when they see Sammy Sosa,” another wrote.
Sammy Sosa is known as one of the greatest professional baseball players of all time. Starting in the late 1980s, he played for the MLB teams the Texas Rangers, Chicago White Sox, and Chicago Cubs. He hit over 600 home runs during his career, but he was also hit with controversy.
According to Yahoo Sports, in June 2003, Sosa was suspended from eight games for using a corked bat. Two years later, he denied using steroids when summoned to testify before the House Government Reform Committee about drug use in the MLB.
In 2009, the New York Times reported that Sosa was one of 104 players who tested positive for steroids in 2003. At the time there was no penalty for a positive test in MLB, the outlet noted.
According to Sports Illustrated, Sosa has always denied using performance-enhancing drugs.
Lala Kent is Embracing Another Meaning of Her Baby’s Name
On the podcast, Kent’s podcast co-host, her brother Easton Burningham, noted that they also found out that Sosa means “salt water” in Portuguese. Burningham claimed the family “had no idea” of the name’s meaning before Sosa was born.
Kent said now that she knows that meaning, she wants to go with that reason for her baby’s name, too. ”By the way, now that we know that let’s rock with that because that’s absolutely amazing,” the new mom said.
Kent initially refused to reveal her baby’s name on her podcast. One day after her daughter’s birth, she announced in a prerecorded episode of “Give Them Lala” that she would not drop her baby’s name because it was also Beyonce’s birthday.
“Today’s Beyoncé’s birthday,” Kent said in the episode that dropped on September 4. “It’s her day. We can’t announce today. You just can’t. No one’s gonna give a [expletive]. It’s Beyoncé’s birthday! I’m gonna wait… Baby S deserves her moment.”
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