Snap counts from St. Louis show how valuable rookie Tyler Lockett already is, how Richard Sherman at nickel increases DeShawn Shead’s role

A tad tardy on this, but here are the snap counts from the Seahawks’ opener Sunday at St. Louis:

The 83 snaps were a lot for a Seattle offense, especially considering the Seahawks went into hurry-up mode only once in the first half, just before halftime, and again for part of their final drive in overtime. That ended with them hurrying even more on fourth and 1 and Marshawn Lynch getting dumped behind the line to end the game. Yet the offense only produced 17 points with all those plays.

Rookie Tyler Lockett’s number jumps out. Seattle traded three picks to move from the bottom to the top of the third round in May’s draft to make Lockett its new kickoff and punt returner. But he immediately during OTAs and rookie minicamp impressed coaches with how polished he was running routes. By the start of training camp he was the No. 3 wide receiver with Doug Baldwin and Jermaine Kearse in the Seahawks’ spread sets. He’s been that way in practices ever since, sometimes bumping Baldwin outside and being the slot receiver and other times taking and outside spot with Baldwin in the slot. Lockett’s skill at separating himself from defensive backs have made him far more integral to the offense than the Seahawks imagined when they drafted him. And with as much as offensive coordinator and play caller Darrell Bevell uses extra receivers, expect Lockett’s snap counts to remain high.

On defense, the official NFL database lists DeShawn Shead as a free safety. But he entered Sunday at cornerback in nickel situations as the fifth defensive back. All-Pro cornerback Richard Sherman moved inside to nickel back. Monday coach Pete Carroll said he liked what he saw with Sherman inside on obvious passing downs because of the “flexibility” it provides. So expect more of Sherman as the inside nickel Sunday night against the Packers in Green Bay.

“Some of the best nickels are the guys that are the most savvy, have the best all-around awareness, you know,” Carroll said. “A guy like Ronde Barber was like a famous nickel guy, he could see and feel everything that was happening.

”Richard has a lot of awareness, and he’s been kind of excited about all the stuff that goes on in there. So he’s pretty charged about trying to figure it out and work with the position and all. He should be really, really good in there just because of all that.”

The coaches obviously aren’t quite comfortable yet using second-year man Kevin Pierre-Louis at outside linebacker at the expense of K.J. Wright’s playing time. Pierre-Louis, the fourth-round draft choice in 2014 from Boston College, may be the Seahawks’ fastest linebacker. But he missed the last half of his rookie season with a shoulder injury and then some more time in the preseason with another shoulder injury.

And, yes, it wasn’t just us feeling Frank Clark didn’t play much. The numbers say that in fact was true for the rookie from Michigan who zoomed throughout the preseason.

This story was originally published September 15, 2015 at 2:34 PM with the headline "Snap counts from St. Louis show how valuable rookie Tyler Lockett already is, how Richard Sherman at nickel increases DeShawn Shead’s role."