caro-kann with 2.Nf3

I play the caro-kann frequently with black and have noticed that white often plays 2.Nf3 d5 3.exd5 in response.  I see this in probably close to 2/3s of my games.  Is this a common modern reply to the caro-kann?  What is making this reply so popular?

I would just like to hear people's general thoughts on this opening line from both white and black's perspective.  I'm cheap and rely heavily on Wikipedia and free online sources and this opening is just not common- except for here on chess.com apparently.

Another idea after 2Nf3 is 2...d5 3.exd5 cxd5 4.Ne5!?, known as the "Apocalypse attack" (...). This is probably not good for an advantage but also not as dumb as it looks, and W can try several plans here.

Bresando and Estragon basically summed it up. I think it is important to give him some ideas as to how to defend against the "Apocolypse Attack"

I don't think in your line W plays the best moves, but black plan is correct.

Yeah, you're right about the moves, many say that the bishop is misplaced on B5 and the Knight move is constricting. I think the line I annotated but didn't puzzle is a more accurate game.