The NFL’s failure to have pylon cameras at every game has created an imbalance in competition. And the NFL points the finger at the networks for that.

The NFL should actually point the finger back at itself.

Every game should have pylon cameras. The highest profile games do. The lower profile games do not.

Walt Anderson, a former referee and senior VP of officiating who now serves as, among other things, the league’s on-air rules analyst, addressed the situation on NFL Networks Game day morning.

“Some games will have camera pylons, some games won’t,” Anderson said. “It’s really up to the networks.”

Is it though? The NFL, on most issues, micromanages the networks. That’s what happens when supply is limited. The supplier dictates terms to the customer, regardless of how much the customer pays for the product.

If the NFL wants pylon cameras at every game, the NFL simply needs to make two phone calls. One for Fox and one for CBS. Because those are games that don’t have pylon cameras. The smaller, second level and below.

Last week’s Falcons-Bucs game, which had Fox No. 2 crew, had no pylon cameras. As a result, the officials ruled that Falcons tight end Kyle Pitts scored a touchdown when he clearly did not. Absent pylon cameras, however, there was no way to override the apparently erroneous judgment on the field.

Anderson said something else that makes it even more important for the league to tell Fox and CBS to reconfigure the budgets to include a row for goal-line cameras.

“As the teams move up and down the field, there are a lot of cameras moving with them,” Anderson said. “So some games, especially the long breakaway games, there might not be a camera on the goal line.”

Right. So have pylon cameras for those moments.

The bottom line is that the NFL is more concerned with the bottom line than getting it right. While the league has the power to tell CBS and Fox to stand up for pylon cameras, there is a broader corporate dance where the music is always softly played. For example, the networks (other than ESPN/ABC) are currently annoyed that the NFL forced Monday Night Football on to ABC for most of the rest of the season. It’s not exactly the best time for the NFL to tell Fox and CBS to spend more money to get the calls right.

Still, it has to happen. It should have happened when the current TV deals were made. Hopefully it will happen during the next round of talks.

Regardless of when that happens, the league has the power to make it happen right now, if the NFL is willing to consume the political capital (or pay the money) necessary to get there. Unless and until the NFL does, it’s fair to say the NFL doesn’t care as much as it should about getting all the calls right.