The Raiders, who lost one former Cincinnati middle linebacker earlier this season, signed another Monday in free agent Preston Brown.

Brown, 27, led the NFL with 144 tackles with the Bills in 2017. He played his first four seasons in Buffalo before signing in 2018 with the Bengals, who released him last week.

The Raiders have rarely used a middle linebacker since Vontaze Burfict was suspended for the season after Week 4, instead playing primarily nickel defense with Tahir Whitehead and Nicholas Morrow as their two linebackers.

Head coach Jon Gruden said Monday that Brown “has all the intangibles … you look for in a middle linebacker.”

“He’s charismatic, he’s intelligent, physical guy, football junkie, and he’s been productive in the league,” Gruden said. “We’ll put him in the room with (linebackers coach David Lippincott) and (defensive coordinator Paul) Guenther and see if he can get caught up quickly.”

Brown said he believes he can get up to speed quickly — he played his first season in Cincinnati for head coach Marvin Lewis, under whom Guenther was a coordinator for four seasons.

“We did a lot of the same stuff, so I have a lot of the terminology down already,” Brown said.

A third-round draft pick in 2014, Brown started all but two games over his four seasons for Buffalo and averaged 128 tackles per season. Brown played seven games with the Bengals on a one-year deal in 2018 and signed a reported three-year, $16.5 million deal prior to this season. He started the first eight games but was cut last Tuesday after totaling 54 tackles.

Raiders left guard Richie Incognito, who played with Brown in Buffalo from 2015 through ’17, said Brown is “a tackling machine.”

“He’s all over the place,” Incognito said. “When I saw him in here for the workout, I was like, ‘Oh, man, I really hope we sign him.’”

Brown, a Cincinnati native, said he worked out for the Raiders on Saturday, a day before they beat the winless Bengals 17-10.

“It was a tough situation over there,” Brown said. “So to come here, there’s a lot more life, a lot more energy, people excited because they’ve got goals that can still be attained.”

In a corresponding roster move, the Raiders placed receiver and return specialist Dwayne Harris on injured reserve with an ankle injury.

Flex time: Kickoff for the Raiders’ game at Kansas City on Dec. 1 was moved from 10 a.m. Pacific to 1:25 p.m., the NFL announced Monday. The matchup has AFC West title implications.

Matt Kawahara is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer.