In the coming days—certainly before next month’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner—I’m told that Axel Springer C.E.O. and controlling shareholder Mathias Döpfner will announce the next editor-in-chief of Politico. It will mark a pivotal event in that now-storied news organization's 20-year history, and one that will hopefully signal something about Mathias’s broader ambitions for a transatlantic media empire that also includes Bild and Die Welt in Berlin and, soon enough, The Telegraph in London.

It will also mark a significant generational shift for Politico. John Harris, the company’s meditative patriarch, has served off and on in the lead editorial role since co-founding the operation in 2007. In January, when he announced his intention to relinquish his seat, I noted that it marked the end of many eras—we’re all too familiar with the history by now—as well as the beginning of a new one: a chance for Mathias to put his imprint on his flagship U.S. asset. What does he want Politico to be? And, as importantly, who does he want to run it?

In the ensuing weeks, Mathias and his deputies Jan Bayer and Claudius Senst met with several prospective candidates, as did Harris and Politico C.E.O. Goli Sheikholeslami, as did the Spencer Stuart headhunter Ashling O’Connor—yes, there are a lot of cooks in this kitchen. Some of the names of those courted leaked here and elsewhere: Washington Post managing editor Peter Spiegel, Wall Street Journal executive editor David Crow, former Associated Press executive editor Julie Pace, and former New York Times editorial page editor James Bennet, among others. The James and Julie talks ended early, with both taking themselves out of the running.

Politico and Springer were initially intrigued by Peter, a former Financial Times managing editor and Brussels bureau chief who joined the Post last year. But the relationship grew lukewarm by February: Harris seemed to want Peter to play a co-starring role alongside Alex Burns, his preferred internal successor, which Peter objected to. Meanwhile, according to sources familiar with their discussions, Harris chafed at the way Peter talked about his current employer and generally felt that he wasn’t the right fit. (In fairness, amateur WaPo ombudsmaning has been something of a national pastime over the last few months. And anyway, this all sounds like pretty standard job interview stuff.) Springer execs maintained an interest in Peter even after relations in Rosslyn had soured, however. (Peter declined to comment for this story.)

By March, Politico’s front office seemed to be more enthusiastic about Crow, a headstrong FT veteran with a reputation for editorial instincts and a less-than-stellar bedside manner. For whatever reason, Crow didn’t make the cut either (one wonders whether they would have even succeeded in prying him away from the Journal, which remains highly influential). In mid-March, Goli asked Ashling to inform both Peter and David that the company had decided to go in a different direction.

Ashling may have been more delicate with the candidates, perhaps suggesting that the search had simply been reopened. In any case, it was enough to inspire Peter to go back to the Post and accept a counteroffer from Matt Murray to stay there. Over the weekend, Peter sent word to Goli and Jan asking to withdraw his candidacy—which, whether he knew it or not, had already been extinguished.

None of this really matters anymore. What it does signal, however, is that Mathias, ultimately the most important cook in the kitchen, has set his sights on another finalist who, I’m told, was brought in by Goli and is in the late stages of negotiation. Alas, I can’t tell you who that is yet—the circle is quite tight on this one. I can tell you who it’s not. Amid all the Politico drama, Springer has also been courting the FT’s U.S. finance editor James Fontanella-Khan, but likely for another role in the portfolio—possibly to fix the mess at Insider or help expand the Morning Brew group—but most likely at The Telegraph. It shouldn’t surprise anyone that so many FT alums have been courted in this process. After all, Mathias tried to buy the paper at one point.

That detail, too, may be notable. In retrospect, so many of the aforementioned candidates seem a little too obvious if ill-equipped for the new multiplatform and A.I.-reliant media landscape. The Spiegels and Paces would seem to make more sense at NOTUS, where Robert Allbritton is trying to re-wage a previous century’s newspaper war with no greater innovation than deep pockets and a desire to unsettle the market. Mathias, a global sophisticate, Netflix board member, and member of the Teterboro class, exists at a higher stratosphere that allows him to see well over Washington’s limited horizon. I don’t yet know who his next editor-in-chief will be, but we all will soon, and one hopes it’s far more inspiring than the usual suspects.