Fencer
Pro Bowl Player
- Joined
- Oct 2, 2006
- Messages
- 14,293
- Reaction score
- 3,986
Reasons to think the Big Nickel might return:
- The Pats now have multi-year investments in three safeties.
- The Pats didn't do much to beef up depth among LBs who are good at covering passes.
- To put it another way, The Pats only have 3 LBs who would be generally characterized as both playable and fast (Thomas, Mayo, Guyton). If they want speed at all positions behind a 3-man DL, some kind of nickel is needed.
- Tank Williams' role is essentially to play in a big nickel, unless it's for 8-in-the-box situations, and it doesn't seem like the latter will arise that much in today's NFL (short-yardage/red zone sub packages perhaps excepted).
- BB has always liked playing a lot of DBs.