ALLEN PARK >> Long after the Detroit Lions dismantled the Tennessee Titans, 52-14, I saw something on social media that struck me.

This phenomenon has happened countless times over the last four weeks, but Detroit’s effortless offensive output has almost left me desensitized to the types of statistics that come across my timeline game after game.

The one that caught my eye (from a user named @JayCuda) was pretty simple, though: Since October 13, the Lions have scored 130 points. The New York Giants have scored 10.

I thought, “How do Giants fans do this?” And not long ago, that’s what people thought about you.

Killing time in the press box before the game, I watched the extended highlights of the last time Detroit played Titans quarterback Mason Rudolph. It was a 16-16 tie against the Pittsburgh Steelers at Heinz Field in a monsoon, the sloppiest game you’ve ever seen.

In hindsight, I couldn’t help but laugh at the fact that the Lions were 0-8 under Dan Campbell to that point and how he hypnotically gazed into the ceiling of the visitors’ media room after the game and said he felt like he was in the Twilight Zone. It looked no different than games under Matt Patricia or Rod Marinelli.

It was the worst of the worst.

Then I closed the video and watched the Lions put up 52 points on 225 yards of offense over the next three hours.

For bad football teams, every game is a chance to hope — an opportunity to believe this is the game where things are different, that this is where the run starts. You manufacture optimism to escape reality.

For teams with the aspirations and talent of the Lions, it’s viewed through a different lens. Every game is assessed with one eye on getting to February. Dreams about what can be are replaced by fears of what won’t be.

Will they handle their business or disappoint me? Will they display wire-to-wire domination, or will they show the one flaw I think can prevent them from winning a Super Bowl?

As this season rolls on, it feels worth emphasizing the 2024 Lions are not just a great team, but a historic one.

How long they’ll be able to keep that pace is anybody’s guess. But I guarantee there are people reading this who still remember the time Kerryon Johnson snapped the franchise’s five-year drought without a 100-yard rusher in a 2018 win over the New England Patriots on Sunday Night Football.

And in the next 12 months, some of those same people will completely forget the Lions had a five-game (and counting) run with more touchdowns (24) than incompletions (19) or that the tandem of Brian Branch and Kerby Joseph singlehandedly led 26 other NFL teams in interceptions through the first eight weeks. It’ll just get washed away in a sea of awesomeness.

Jahmyr Gibbs tied the NFL record Sunday for the most consecutive games (six) with an average of 5.0 yards per carry (min. 10 attempts) — drawing even with Franco Harris, Adrian Peterson and Chris Johnson — and it was like the 24th-most noteworthy thing that happened in the game.

I think a lot about last season and how things have changed. I think about what it was like to navigate the freshness of these Lions triumphs and how the fans reacted to Detroit snapping one longstanding futility stat after another. It was a full-on cleansing of the football soul. Over decades, the past was an indicator of the future. Now, it’s just the past. But the future looms larger than ever, and that carries a heavy weight, in its own right.

On social media (to be fair, not always an accurate representation of the group), the overwhelming response from Lions fans to Sunday’s 38-point win has been, “That’s great, now go trade for an edge rusher.”

I’ve seen some fans even meet the emphatic nature of the win (and a six-pressure performance from practice-squad callup Al-Quadin Muhammad) with mild annoyance because they think it might discourage Lions general manager Brad Holmes from adding before the Nov. 5 trade deadline.

I get it. The goal is to win it all. Anything short of that is a massive disappointment — but look around. The Chicago Bears lost on a Hail Mary on Sunday because one of their players was taunting fans while the play was happening and missed his assignment. The Jacksonville Jaguars’ playoff run in 2022 was merely a catalyst for embarrassment in the years that followed. The Cleveland Browns and New York Jets — all of these teams used to be in a class where the Lions are now — are fruitlessly scratching and clawing for an ounce of respectability.

In 20 years, when you’re looking back on these Lions, you won’t bemoan how the one or two players who provided optimism were let down by the organization. You’ll say, “Oh, and then they had this awesome punt returner, Kalif Raymond…”

You’ll easily recall the names of under-the-radar contributors like Brock Wright and Amik Robertson in the same way you remember names like Mehmet Okur, Alex Avila and Dan Cleary.

You’ll associate these moments with the people you love. I’d bet there are a lot of people out there who can earnestly say that the last two seasons of Lions football have brought them closer to their friends and family.

All of this is to say: You are in “the good ol’ days.”

Cherish them. Squeeze every last ounce of joy you can out of beating up on a crappy Titans team. Don’t take for granted that when your head hit the pillow on Sunday night, you weren’t wondering when the pain and suffering would end.

No matter how long this era of successful Lions football lasts, rest assured there will come a day when it’s over. Dark days came for the Dallas Cowboys. The New England Patriots are experiencing them now.

After 25 consecutive playoff appearances, the Red Wings currently own the second-longest playoff drought (eight seasons) in the NHL. Think about what you’d give up to watch Nicklas Lidstrom and Brian Rafalski man the power play just one more time; to watch 48 minutes of Ben Wallace shutting down Shaquille O’Neal; to watch prime Justin Verlander take the mound in a packed Comerica Park on a random Tuesday in August with Miguel Cabrera due up in the bottom of the inning.

Yes, the Lions need to add an edge rusher. But they’re also 6-1 for the first time in 68 years and are the odds-on favorite to represent the NFC in the Super Bowl. There are few fan bases that would take their current situation over what’s happening in Detroit.

So don’t let the fear of heartbreak stop you from enjoying a period of your life that you’ll eventually want back.