MIAMI GARDENS — As hard as it was to see Bradley Chubb down and the cart coming out — and make no mistake, for everyone on the Dolphins, it was tough — there was another moment when it hit Emmanuel Ogbah.

“Going into the outside linebackers room, you know,” Ogbah said. “Just seeing the empty seats just makes you think, like, ‘Damn.’ Like we lost another brother.”

There are too many empty seats in that room today. First, it was Jaelan Phillips, lost for the season with an Achilles injury. Now, Chubb has a torn ACL and his season is over, too. You’ve heard of big shoes to fill? Ogbah surveyed the room knowing there are massive chairs to fill.

That’s where Ogbah and Melvin Ingram come in. Two veterans on the north side of 30, one of whom (Ogbah) was a scratch the past couple of weeks, the other without a team until the Dolphins called three weeks ago.

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Sunday night, the Dolphins play host to the Buffalo Bills and nemesis Josh Allen with the AFC East title on the line. Nobody is expecting Ogbah and Ingram to equal Phillips and Chubb, but the Dolphins need them to show flashes to contain Allen as a passer and a runner.

Neither man has any doubt he’ll rise to the occasion.

“I’ve been playing in this league for a long time and I’m confident in my abilities,” Ogbah said. “And I’m ready to step up.”

Melvin Ingram, Emmanuel Ogbah have 99.5 sacks between them

A few weeks ago, Ingram was coaching his kids, ages 4 and 8, in a slew of sports in North Carolina. No matter. He almost takes it as a personal affront to be asked how confident the Dolphins are in him now that they’ve re-signed him.

“What do you think they think my confidence is?” he said. “C’mon, man. You answered your own question.”

Their pedigree cannot be questioned. Ingram, 34, was a first-round pick of the Chargers in 2012, Ogbah, 30, a second-rounder of Cleveland in 2016. Together, they have played in 253 games, made 673 tackles and sacked quarterbacks 99.5 times.

But much of that spans the years. Ingram played the past two games, but Ogbah was declared inactive for both and couldn’t hide his displeasure over not playing against the Ravens. As inactives were announced, Ogbah tweeted, “Wow. lol.” Ogbah said coaches didn’t offer much of an explanation why.

“That was just my feelings at the moment,” he said of the tweet.

Ingram has been experiencing the flip side, playing but budgeted to 37 snaps the past two weeks, making two tackles. His confidence was blatantly obvious in this exchange with reporters:

Q: How has it felt to be out there?

A: Amazing.

Q: Is everything back? The speed, the quickness?

A: Yes. It never left.

Q: How tough is it for an NFL player to not play and then be thrown into playoff-caliber games?

A: I can’t speak for everybody else but I know it isn’t tough for me.

Anthony Campanile: Bradley Chubb ‘a great human being'

Maybe so, but succeeding Chubb, who has been playing at a Pro Bowl level, is a tough assignment for anyone.

“It's hard to fill a void like that because the guy is so beloved in the locker room by the coaches and the players,” linebackers coach Anthony Campanile said. “So we're going to miss, obviously, his personality out there. He's just a great human being, that guy. Like, if you can't coach that guy, you shouldn't coach, honestly.”

Defensive players will have Phillips and Chubb on their minds Sunday, Ogbah said.

“When J.P. went down, we decided to dedicate a season to him and I was going to dedicate the rest of the season to Chubb as a key part of our defense.”

Coordinator Vic Fangio is entering the game counting on both veterans to fill the void.

“It’s going to be by committee, for sure,” Fangio said.

Ogbah says it's ’definitely tough' adjusting to role

Ogbah has a significant cap number, $17.8 million, thanks to two consecutive nine-sack seasons for the Dolphins. After making just one sack in nine games last year, he has 5.5 in 14 games, all in reserve, this season. It has been an adjustment for him, playing only 200 defensive snaps this season. Whatever he finishes with will be the fewest in his career, easily lower than the previous low of 328.

“Not seeing the field nearly as much, it’s definitely tough,” Ogbah said. “But whenever my name is called I try to go out there and just help out the team the way I can.”

Ingram said he enjoyed coaching his kids in basketball, football and soccer, but always hoped to latch on with a team. He said he had feelers.

“But I wanted to be here, so just hadn’t got the right call,” he said.

Why here?

“Just because I had already started something here,” Ingram said. “I’ve got a house here and now it’s something special I wanted to be a part of.”

Many defensive players have said it takes some doing to adjust to Fangio’s system. Not Ingram, whom Fangio said is better suited toward helping in coverage when needed.

“I’m a very smart guy,” he said. “I’ll pick up a lot of things pretty easy.”

Allen has largely had his way against the Dolphins. Ogbah and Ingram will have a significant say in whether that changes this weekend.

“Just get after him the best way we can,” Ogbah said. “You can’t really rush too scared.”

Ingram: “Josh is a tremendous athlete. He's one of the best in this business, so just got to try to cancel out everything and play smashmouth football.”

Dolphins reporter Hal Habib can be reached at  hhabib@pbpost.com. Follow him on social media @gunnerhal. Click here to subscribe.

Sunday's game

Bills (10-6) at Dolphins (11-5)

8:15 p.m., NBC; streaming on Fubo, NFL+, Peacock and YouTube Sunday Ticket outside South Florida

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Emmanuel Ogbah, Melvin Ingram out to fill void on edge for Miami Dolphins