“Marty is a very good newsman, a no-nonsense, really bright guy who believes in the power of news, and that is highly contagious in a newsroom,” said Tom Rosenstiel, the executive director of the American Press Institute. “Momentum matters a lot in a news organization.”

Mr. Baron is a well-traveled and well-thought-of veteran who worked at The Miami Herald, The Los Angeles Times and The New York Times before becoming the executive editor of The Herald in 2000 and then quickly moving to the top job at The Boston Globe in 2001. In that period, he distinguished himself as a leader of journalists, but at both The Globe and The Herald, his tenure coincided with financial chaos, cuts and reduced ambitions.

The Post is the first time he has been handed a baton that was not on fire — Marcus Brauchli, the previous editor, was not universally praised but made important moves to modernize its approach to news — and he has run with it.

“With Jeff, we have the stability and resources to invest,” Mr. Baron said by phone. “I think there are also intangibles in our business that matter enormously. Reporters need to know that they will be supported, that their colleagues aren’t going to disappear and that they can do their job without being worried all the time about losing it. Optimism, like negativity, can be infectious.”

Part of The Post’s current visibility has to do with an increasing sophistication in promoting its content nationally; according to comScore, The Post had 39,452,000 unique visitors in July, an increase of 63 percent from a year before. But it’s more than digital magic. The killer app, as I have written before, is real, actual news. And The Post has generated a ton of it.

Apart from the unfolding story on a series of security lapses at the Secret Service, including uncovering new details on just how far a fence-jumper got into the White House, and the reporting on the Virginia corruption, there was a great investigation on the police seizing millions from motorists not charged with crimes, and a piece on how good project management took a back seat to politics during the health care rollout.

There have been many others, but the current run began with a huge bang in June 2013, when Barton Gellman brought a series of high-risk, highly complicated articles to the newspaper based on leaks from the former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden. The Post, along with The Guardian, received a prestigious public service Pulitzer Prize for its efforts.