Detroit Pistons executive vice president of basketball operations Michael Blackstone is continuing his front-office work while undergoing treatment for Stage 4 lung cancer, a diagnosis he received in 2023 after persistent pain in his right shoulder proved to be cancer that had spread from his lung to his shoulder and spine.
Key takeaways
- Blackstone, 54, is being treated at Mayo Clinic for metastatic non-small cell lung cancer.
- He said he pushed for a PET scan after initial medical guidance did not identify the cause of his pain.
- Blackstone has never smoked and wants his story to prompt people to raise concerns and seek answers from their doctors.
- He joined Detroit in 2024 after Trajan Langdon brought him from the New Orleans Pelicans.
- Blackstone has remained active at Pistons practices, shootarounds, games and roster meetings during treatment.
A question that changed everything
Blackstone was working as New Orleans’ vice president of basketball administration when doctors found the cancer. His family was in New Orleans, but he returned to his Florida home for primary medical care. About a day and a half after hearing the diagnosis, he sat alone on his porch and cried.
The warning sign had been discomfort in his right shoulder. It was eventually determined that the pain came from disease that had already metastasized. Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer deaths in the United States, and the five-year survival rate for late-stage or metastatic non-small cell lung cancer is 12 percent.
Blackstone said the essential step was refusing to let the pain be dismissed. “If I had followed the first answer I got and not insisted on the scan with my doctor, I would not be having this conversation,” he said.
He is speaking publicly now because he wants others to act on symptoms that might otherwise be written off. His message is straightforward: ask what is wrong, keep asking questions and advocate for appropriate testing.
“Time is what matters,” Blackstone said. “It was already Stage 4 when they found it.”
Still on the Pistons’ daily schedule
Blackstone accepted the Detroit position without knowing how much time his illness would allow him to devote to building the roster beside Langdon. He arrived from the Pelicans in 2024 and has continued to handle the daily work of a front office: calls in the Performance Center hallways, meetings in boardrooms and constant evaluation of what Detroit needs to become a contender.
He has regularly attended home and road shootarounds, practices and games. For much of that time, he did not tell Pistons staff members about his diagnosis, sharing the news only in recent weeks.
Basketball has been part of the structure that carries him through radiation treatment. Blackstone said Detroit’s identity — a city built around toughness and persistence — gives his own fight an added meaning.
“In a difficult way, it fits that I am here,” he said of Detroit. “This is a place that is about fighting.”
His approach is to follow the treatment plan, question his doctors closely and remain present in his life rather than retreat from it. He acknowledged the fear that comes with the diagnosis, but said he is grateful for his family, friends, career, support system and the people around the Pistons.
“I love being alive,” Blackstone said. “I want to stay here as long as I can. I am trying to live as normally as possible, while understanding that I have to adjust some things.”
Blackstone said advances in lung-cancer treatment leave room for optimism that the disease can increasingly be managed as a chronic condition rather than viewed only as a fatal one. He plans to keep working at a high level for as long as he can, while using his experience to make people more alert to their own health.
“There is hope,” he said. “Pay attention to the signs and do not ignore them.”
