A system that incorporates teachings of the subject disclosure may include, for example, receiving video content at a communication device, providing the video content to a video buffer of the communication device, commencing playback of the video content at the communication device, determining buffer status information that represents a capacity of the video buffer and an amount of the capacity that has been utilized, monitoring for a buffer exhaustion condition based on the buffer status information, and adjusting the playback of the video content responsive to a detection of the buffer exhaustion condition. Other embodiments are disclosed.