Lifting football's labor lockout without a new contract in place would allow better-off teams to sign the best players, tipping the NFL's competitive balance and damaging the league, attorneys for the owners argued in court papers Monday. The 74-page filing to the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis laid out the league's position in advance of a June 3 hearing on its appeal of a key decision by U.S. District Judge Susan Richard Nelson.