Ted Lerner, founding principal owner of Nationals, dies at 97

Theodore N. Lerner, the onetime usher at Griffith Stadium who went on to build a local real estate empire, then purchase the Nationals from Major League Baseball and watch the franchise win its first World Series title, has died. He was 97.

Mr. Lerner’s death, which came two days before pitchers and catchers are due to report for spring training, was announced by the club this morning.

“It is with great sadness that we announce the passing of Founding Managing Principal Owner, Theodore N. Lerner,” the Nationals said in a statement. “The crowning achievement of his family business was bringing baseball back to the city he loved - and with it, bringing a championship home for the first time since 1924. He cherished the franchise and what it brought to his beloved hometown.”

A lifelong Washingtonian who grew up rooting for local sports teams, Mr. Lerner was born Oct. 15, 1925, the same day the Senators lost Game 7 of the World Series to the Pirates, one year after the franchise won its one and only championship. He attended occasional games as a child and became a ballpark usher as a teenager, then like so many other area baseball fans was heartbroken when the second incarnation of the Senators relocated to Texas following the 1971 season.

By then, Mr. Lerner was already two decades into his professional career, having founded Lerner Enterprises in 1952 off a $250 loan from his wife, Annette, and built it into the largest private real estate company in the region.

After an attempt to purchase Washington’s NFL team in the 1990s, Mr. Lerner and his family set their sights on owning an MLB franchise. When the league-owned Montreal Expos moved to D.C. following the 2004 season, Mr. Lerner was one of several notable parties interested in purchasing the team.

On May 3, 2006, MLB officially approved the sale of the Nationals to the family for $450 million, with the notably private, soft-spoken Mr. Lerner named managing principal owner. He would hold that title until 2018, when he handed day-to-day control of the organization to his son, Mark, though he continued to be an active participant in team decision-making as founding principal owner.

“Ted Lerner was a proud product of Washington, D.C., an avid baseball fan and an extraordinary American success story," MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said in a statement released by the league. "In 2006, this onetime usher at Griffith Stadium took ownership in the nation’s capital, and in 2008 made Nationals Park a first-class destination. The Nationals’ era of winning baseball culminated in the 2019 World Series championship, the first for baseball fans in the District since 1924. Most importantly, the Nationals have always remained loyal to Ted’s vision of unity, philanthropy and civic pride in Washington. I have great appreciation for Ted’s impact on his hometown and the game he loved. On behalf of Major League Baseball, I extend my deepest condolences to Ted’s entire family.”

In his time running the franchise, Mr. Lerner oversaw the hiring of Mike Rizzo, first as assistant general manager and then as permanent GM after Jim Bowden resigned in 2009. He approved the signing of free agent Jayson Werth to a then-franchise-record, seven-year, $126 million contract in December 2010, then doled out subsequent nine-figure deals to Ryan Zimmerman, Max Scherzer, Stephen Strasburg and Patrick Corbin, eventually escalating the team’s payroll to one of the most-expensive in baseball for a sustained stretch.

Mr. Lerner’s ability to work directly with super-agent Scott Boras helped make some of those deals possible, though the two also weren’t able to finalize proposed extensions with stars Bryce Harper, Juan Soto and Anthony Rendon, nor with the agency that represents Trea Turner. In the end, all four departed, with Harper and Rendon leaving as free agents while Soto and Turner (along with Scherzer) were traded for prospects within the last two years.

Mr. Lerner’s relationships with Nationals managers also had their ups and downs. He chose not to retain Frank Robinson, Davey Johnson and Dusty Baker after each man’s contract expired, he fired Manny Acta and Matt Williams before their contracts ended and he watched Jim Riggleman resign following a walk-off win due to a contract dispute.

The November 2018 hiring of Davey Martinez, however, would lead to the organization’s greatest on-field success and establish the kind of managerial continuity the franchise had sorely lacked since it arrived in town.

Despite an underwhelming, 19-31 start to the season, and despite immense speculation from the outside, Mr. Lerner did not fire Martinez at that low point in May 2019. That faith paid off spectacularly when Martinez helped guide a veteran-laden roster back into contention, then a wild card berth, then a remarkable postseason run that included a National League pennant-clinching celebration on his 94th birthday and culminated two weeks later with the entire family on a stage in Houston hoisting the Commissioner’s Trophy.

“They say good things come to those who wait,” Mr. Lerner said at the Nationals’ victory parade that weekend. “Ninety-five years is a pretty long wait. But I’ll tell you, this is worth the wait. This is for the city that’s always believed, the players that always fought and the fans that were with us every step of the way.”

If the World Series represented the emotional high point of the Nationals’ existence, the events of the following year might have represented the emotional low point. Preparations for a year-long victory lap were thrown into disarray when the COVID-19 pandemic shut down the entire world in March 2020. The Nats would not play a single regular season game in front of fans that season, and full capacity at Nationals Park was not allowed again until June 2021.

The ramifications of the pandemic were severe on both of the Lerner family’s businesses. With the commercial real estate market collapsing as the baseball franchise decided to embark on a massive rebuilding effort, the Lerners revealed in April 2022 plans to explore a possible sale of the franchise.

That sale has not yet taken place, and Mark Lerner and his sisters Marla Lerner Tanenbaum and Debra Lerner Cohen, their spouses and Mr. Lerner’s widow Annette, continue to run the organization. They will now do so with heavy hearts for their departed patriarch.