mradtke66
Cheesehead
I believe we spent more time in the nickel because we had a lack of talent at the DE position. And you are right about the lack of need for a pass rush from our DL. They will get a few, but it needs to come from our LBs. Reiterating my comment from page 1 - a good DE will make our LBs look much better.
I don't think we spend so much time in nickel because of a lack defensive line (though that could be part of it), but rather because teams would rather throw against us.
We're normally very tough to run against. Pickett, Raji, and Bishop make for a very tough middle. If you come out in base (and you don't have a world-beater tight end), we'll come out in base.
If you tendencies and/or formation tells Capes "pass," he'll trot out nickel. This also puts Woodson in the best position to succeed at Saftey-Nickel-Backer instead of covering the outside guy. I make the argument that this is almost a 'base' set anyway.
Woodson (though slipping now) is a pretty sure tackler. He's basically a linebacker. So loop back around to my previous statement that our OLBs are more like defensive ends in nickel. We have our 4 'linemen' (Matthews, Raji, Pickett, and the other guy) and three linebackers (Woodson, Hawk, Bishop.) That looks an awful lot like a Front 7 to me, albeit one that is stacked to stop the pass, not the run.