PHILADELPHIA -- Baseball's lawyers asked a federal judge Tuesday to overturn an arbitrator's order to rehire nine of the 22 umpires who haven't worked a game since September 1999.

Lawyers for the umpires, in turn, asked U.S. District Judge Harvey Bartle III to force baseball to take back all 22 of the umps who lost their jobs following a failed mass resignation.

Howard Ganz, the lawyer for owners, said the dispute should not have been subject to arbitration and said that once the umpires resigned, baseball did not have to allow them to withdraw their resignations.

Pat Campbell, the umpires' lawyer, called the May 11 decision by arbitrator Alan Symonette "bizarre." Campbell said the umpires were fired and that the terminations violated their labor contract because they weren't based on lack of "skill and merit."

By refusing to order the rehiring of 13 umps, a group that includes Rich Garcia and Eric Gregg, Symonette "misapplied the law and overlooked the evidence that was in the arbitration hearing," Campbell said.

Bartle did not say when he will rule. He has the option of sending the case back to an arbitrator.

Both sides have had settlement talks within the last month, according to Clifford Haines, a lawyer for Richie Phillips, the head of the umpires' former union. Baseball has refused to settle the case unless Phillips drops a civil suit against the sport and its top officials, and Ganz called the prospects of a settlement "bleak."

None of the affected umpires was in court Tuesday.

Symonette ordered baseball to rehire Drew Coble, Gary Darling, Bill Hohn, Greg Kosc, Larry Poncino, Larry Vanover and Joe West. Symonette also said baseball must take back two umpires who have said they intended to retire _ Frank Pulli and Terry Tata _ and give all 11 back pay for the time they missed.

In the ruling, Symonette said former NL president Len Coleman "abused his discretion" by not clearly explaining his decision to accept the resignations.

Umpires had resigned as part of a bargaining strategy devised by Phillips, head of the Major League Umpires Association.

But most AL umpires either quickly withdrew their resignations or failed to resign, causing the strategy to collapse. By then, owners had hired 25 new umpires from the minor leagues and got rid of the 22.

Baseball offered to rehire 10 of the 22 at the major league level, rehire three at the minor league level, give four buyouts and allow the other five to retire. Phillips' union rejected the offer, deciding to take its chances with Symonette.

Umpires opposed to Phillips formed a new union, won a federally supervised vote and ousted the old union in February 20p0. They then negotiated a new contract that allowed owners to merge umpires for the two leagues into a unified staff.