{"id":14935,"date":"2025-10-22T01:48:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-22T01:48:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/14935\/"},"modified":"2025-10-22T01:48:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-22T01:48:10","slug":"report-texas-s-michael-taaffe-underwent-thumb-surgery-on-monday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/14935\/","title":{"rendered":"Report: Texas S Michael Taaffe underwent thumb surgery on Monday"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">The injury status of Texas Longhorns redshirt senior safety Michael Taaffe is in question with Tuesday\u2019s report from Pete Nakos of On3Sports that Taaffe underwent thumb surgery on Monday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">According to Nakos, Taaffe is expected to return at some point this season, but even the short-term loss of Taaffe would be significant for the Longhorns \u2014 the former walk on is a team leader and integral to communication and playmaking in the secondary as a reliable force in coverage and as a tackler.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">A missed tackle forced by Florida running back Jadan Baugh is the only missed tackle credited to Taaffe this year by Pro Football Focus. As a pass defender, Taaffe has allowed seven catches on nine targets for 41 yards. With a grade of 91.1, Taaffe is tied as the highest-graded safety in the country, according to PFF.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Taaffe leads the Longhorns with 51 tackles, adding one tackle for loss, one sack, and one interception.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Redshirt sophomore Derek Williams is listed as Taaffe\u2019s backup, but has played sparingly this season, logging 88 snaps in his return from a season-ending knee injury and recording seven tackles so far.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The injury status of Texas Longhorns redshirt senior safety Michael Taaffe is in question with Tuesday\u2019s report from&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14936,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[27,29,536,6467,28],"class_list":{"0":"post-14935","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-texas","8":"tag-texas","9":"tag-texas-headlines","10":"tag-texas-longhorns-football","11":"tag-texas-longhorns-football-injuries","12":"tag-texas-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14935","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14935"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14935\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}