I am really not trying to start anything here, but it seems that elite benefits should be consistent... if AA is going to block middle seats for people with lap children (who after all, made a conscious decision to save money by not purchasing that seat outright) it should really extend the same benefit to elites traveling without lap children as well. When individual AAgents start violating this policy (by that, I mean the official policy of not blocking middle seats in general anymore), it makes it seem like AA is undervaluing elites (especially since AA used to provide this as an elite benefit).

I'm not saying that that's what happened in this case, the OP could have simply gotten lucky, in which case I'm happy for him, I just think that if AA is going to start making exceptions in blocking seats for people, it should really be based on status, and should be official policy.