WASHINGTON — The Washington Nationals will be sold to developer Theodore Lerner's group, which Major League Baseball selected over seven other suitors to buy the franchise for about $450 million.

The selection was confirmed Wednesday by a baseball official who spoke on condition of anonymity because the announcement, expected in a late afternoon conference call, had not been made.

Lerner's group, which includes former Atlanta Braves executive Stan Kasten, beat out top contenders including groups headed by former Seattle Mariners owner Jeffrey Smulyan, and by Fred Malek and Jeffrey Zients.

Kasten is close to baseball commissioner Bud Selig, who made the selection, and was among the management executives who assisted in the 1994-5 strike negotiations. Katsen wouldn't comment when contacted Tuesday night.

Lerner, a Maryland-based real estate businessman, was likely to hold a news conference later Wednesday. His selection was first reported by The Washington Post on its Web site late Wednesday morning.

On Tuesday, the D.C. Council rejected a proposal that would have urged baseball to pick the Malek-Zients or Smulyan groups.

Major League Baseball's other 29 clubs bought the then-Montreal Expos in 2002 for $120 million as part of a complicated transaction that also involved new owners for the Boston Red Sox and Florida Marlins.

After moving the Expos to Washington for the 2005 season, baseball hoped to sell before the Nationals had played a game in their new city. Then the goal was the early summer, then the All-Star break, then the end of last season.

By November, Selig said he would stop setting timetables for completing the team's sale.