Buffalo received plenty of insult to injury in Monday's heartbreaking loss to New England when Paul Posluszny broke his arm. The Bills' middle linebacker is expected to miss the next six weeks. Maybe more.

Filling Posluszny's shoes will be the decisively smaller Marcus Buggs. The 5-foot-11, 238-pound Buggs will be expected to take command of Buffalo's defensive huddle despite only appearing in four games as a special-teamer last season. He ended up on the team's injured-reserve list with a high-ankle sprain.

"I'm ready for the opportunity," Buggs told the Buffalo News. "I'm totally confident in myself that I'll be able to handle it."

Kawika Mitchell and Keith Ellison will remain the starters at outside linebacker.

"There's more responsibilities getting the play called to the defense, getting the defense lined up, getting everybody set and ready to play the play, making checks throughout the play according to formations," Buggs said. "The vocal part is the biggest change, having to know all those things and being able to communicate them out in time for everybody to play the play."

If the promotion doesn't pan out, look for the Bills to move Ellison to the inside and buoy Nic Harris to weak side linebacker. Buffalo took a big gamble not adding any linebackers in the offseason. Depth was a major concern heading into the season. We'll see if they were right to have confidence in Buggs soon. Tampa Bay boasts a solid three-way running attack in Cadillac Williams, Derrick Ward and Earnest Graham. The Bucs gashed the Dallas Cowboys for 173 rushing yards last week. Williams had 97 and Ward had 62.