Enomoto showed for finite dimensional algebras that the classification of exact structures on the category of finitely generated projective modules can be reduced to the classification of 2-regular simple modules. In this article, we give a combinatorial classification of 2-regular simple modules for Nakayama algebras and we use this classification to answer several natural questions such as when there is a unique exact structure on the category of finitely generated projective modules for Nakayama algebras. We also classify 1-regular simple modules, quasi-hereditary Nakayama algebras and Nakayama algebras of global dimension at most two. It turns out that most classes are enumerated by well-known combinatorial sequences, such as Fibonacci, Riordan and Narayana numbers. We first obtain interpretations in terms of the Auslander-Reiten quiver of the algebra using homological algebra, and then apply suitable bijections to relate these to combinatorial statistics on Dyck paths.