{"id":242974,"date":"2025-10-22T07:32:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-22T07:32:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/242974\/"},"modified":"2025-10-22T07:32:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-22T07:32:10","slug":"michael-taaffe-injury-update-texas-db-undergoes-thumb-surgery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/242974\/","title":{"rendered":"Michael Taaffe injury update: Texas DB undergoes thumb surgery"},"content":{"rendered":"

According to On3\u2019s Pete Nakos<\/a>, Texas Longhorns<\/a> safety Michael Taaffe<\/a> underwent thumb surgery on Monday. Taaffe is expected to miss some time but the exact timeline is not yet known. If there is any positive news<\/a> on the situation, the injury is not expected to end his season.<\/p>\n

In a defense full of stud players, Taaffe is one of the more important players for Texas. His experience in the back-end helps in what is a highly competitive safety room, having played 50 games throughout his career. Taaffe originally came into the program as a walk-on before working his way onto full scholarship under head coach Steve Sarkisian<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery single day when I wake up, I think, \u2018Man, this is awesome, I\u2019m truly living my dream,\u201d Taaffe said during the preseason about playing at Texas<\/a>. \u201cEverything I do every single day is because I\u2019m so blessed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Taaffe has played in all seven games this season for Texas, recording 51 tackles and one tackle for a loss. His lone interception of the year came when the Longhorns traveled down to Gainesville, a game they eventually lost to Florida<\/a>. His play shows up in many ways we cannot see on the stat sheet, though.<\/p>\n

Exactly when the injury took place is unclear. Texas just went through a roller coaster the past two weeks despite two wins. Beating Oklahoma<\/a> in Dallas during the Red River Shootout (a place where thumb injuries were a big talking point due to John Mateer<\/a>) brought the high point of the season thus far, before crashing back down to reality at Kroger Field against Kentucky<\/a>. Overtime was needed to beat the Wildcats, including a goal line stand from Taaffe\u2019s unit.<\/p>\n

Next up on the schedule is a trip to Starkville to play Mississippi State<\/a>, the second one in program history. Texas then hosts Vanderbilt<\/a> for what could be quite an important showdown before enjoying a bye week. Two of the final three games for UT are considered massive rivalries, going up against Arkansas<\/a> and Texas A&M<\/a> \u2014 both in Austin. No easy task comes in the other game, rolling into Athens for a showdown vs. Georgia<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If Taaffe does not miss the rest of the season, as Nakos reports, he should be able to at least play in the Texas A&M season finale. No matter when he returns, Texas is going to miss one of its top defensive backs in a big way.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"According to On3\u2019s Pete Nakos, Texas Longhorns safety Michael Taaffe underwent thumb surgery on Monday. Taaffe is expected…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":242975,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[399,133442,398,396,397,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-242974","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-michael-taaffe-21-westlake","10":"tag-ncaa","11":"tag-ncaa-football","12":"tag-ncaafootball","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242974","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=242974"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242974\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/242975"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=242974"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=242974"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=242974"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}